Abstract
Food adulteration has become a serious public health issue with implications for food safety, consumer rights, and trust in the food supply system. Intentional or accidental alteration, substitution, addition, or removal of substances from food means that food products may no longer have the necessary quality, adequate nutritional value, or safety. Consumption of contaminated food products might result in occurrence of illnesses caused by consumption of food with pathogenic agents in it, nutritional deficiencies, chronic health problems, and negative socio-economic effects.
In India, supervision over food safety is implemented through the Food Safety and Standards Act of 2006, creating the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) aimed at making safe and quality food available to consumers. Though India has been using a well-structured legal approach to food supervision, several issues call for attention, such as insufficient enforcement of the law, inadequate availability of testing facilities, lack of awareness, and changing nature of fraud. Judicial practice has also proved to be helpful in making food safety regulation more effective through appearance of courtsdecisions protecting consumers from adverse impact of food adulteration.
This paper explores the idea, types, and effects of food adulteration on consumer health. It also reviews the various detection methods, including traditional techniques, chromatography processes, and DNA analysis. The study shows substantial advancements in science and technology that help in developing better methods for food adulteration detection and effective enforcement mechanisms.
Keywords: Food Adulteration, Food Safety, FSSAI, Food Safety and Standards Act, Consumer Protection, Public Health, Food Fraud, Detection Methods, Food Regulation, India.
INTRODUCTION
Provision of safe and nutritious food is essential for both the protection of public health and the preservation of human dignity. Changes in food safety over time from being a public health concern have changed food safety into an important issue concerning law and regulation due to the increasing number of fraud cases.
To maintain a healthy population and society, it is important to have access to safe and nutritious food. Food adulteration, which refers to the intentional or unintentional addition, replacement, omission, or modification of a food ingredient in such a way that it alters its quality, safety, or nutritional value, is an obstacle to food safety in countries around the world;[1] this has become even more true recently with the increasing incidence of food adulteration, especially in developing countries like India.[2]Food adulteration is largely motivated by economic profit, where unscrupulous traders deliberately impair food quality with the aim of making money at the expense of the health of the people.
While some of the negative effects of food adulteration can occur (e.g., through consumption of contaminated food) and others can occur at a later time (e.g., through chronic diseases caused by occasional consumption of contaminated food), the effects of food adulteration are widespread and no one is exempt from food-related health problems caused by consuming adulterated food. Health risks of food adulteration depend on both the type of adulteration, as well as on exposure time.
The prevalence of insecure goods such as milk, cooking oil,seasonings, confectionery items, fruit, and all other everyday household food items proves to us that food adulteration is morethan just an issue for the consumer; it also represents a huge public health andlegal issues.
A comprehensive framework of legislation exists in India designed to control the safety of foods, primarily the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, and the subsequent establishment of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) with oversight authority over that Act. Although this legislation was intended to regulate and control food safety and functionality of these functions the FSSAI has encountered many difficulties in carrying out those functions. Some of the reasons for this failure are limited to insufficient inspection of foods and their ingredients by the FSSAI, not having the proper equipment to test samples, being unaware of their rights, and the ever-changing techniques of unscrupulous individuals who produce and sell food products, etc. In the case of Pyarali K. Tejani v. Mahadeo Ramchandra Dange, the Apex Court held that offences of food adulteration are crimes related to social welfare, leads to strict punishment in order to protect public health.[3]Advances in forensic science and food testing have added a great deal of strength to the implementation of food safety regulations and ensured accuracy in identifying cases of food adulteration.
The Supreme Court focused on the implementation of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act in the case of Municipal Corporation of Delhi v. Kacheroo Mal, and stated that the purpose of the Act is to protect consumers against the negative consequences of eating adulterated food and therefore needs to be interpreted in ways that would contribute to the achievement of its protective objectives.[4]
[1]S. Bansal, A. Singh, M. Mangal, A. Mangal & S. Kumar, Food Adulteration: Sources, Health Risks, and Detection Methods, 57(6) Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition 1174 (2017).
[2]A. Haji, K. Desalegn & H. Hassen, Selected Food Items Adulteration, Their Impacts on Public Health, and Detection Methods: A Review, 11 Food Science & Nutrition 7534 (2023).
[3]Pyarali K. Tejani v. Mahadeo Ramchandra Dange, (1974) 1 S.C.C. 167.
[4] Municipal Corporation of Delhi v. Kacheroo Mal, A.I.R. 1976 S.C. 394.