Nearly a month after opening its first store in India, the Swedish home furniture company IKEA has found itself in an embarrassing situation after a customer complained about finding a caterpillar in the food served to him in the IKEA restaurant at Hyderabad.
The incident happened on Friday when a customer named Abeed Mohammad was served a vegetable biryani in which he found a caterpillar. He immediately informed the Food Safety Officer with the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC).
Abeed tweeted about the incident with the photos and in his tweet, he also tagged KT Rama Rao, the Minister for Municipal Administration and Urban Development.
#Ikeahyderbad Today I found caterpillar in my veg biryani. Very unfair of food @TV9Telugu @KTRTRS sir @hydcitypolice @THHyderabad @Abnandhrajyothi pic.twitter.com/jumiED25fs
— Abeed Mohammad (@abeedmohammed9) August 31, 2018
The team of GHMC visited the IKEA restaurant at Hi-Tech City and found the complaint to be true. A fine of Rs. 11,500 was imposed on the restaurant by GHMC through their app and food samples were taken by them for getting tested at the lab.
Notices have been issued to the restaurant manager as well as to Haldirams, Nagpur, the vendor from where the IKEA restaurant procures food. The food safety team of IKEA will also visit the Haldiram supplier that is based at Nagpur. The firm has also issued an apology, regretting the unfortunate experience that the customer had in their restaurant.
IKEA India tweeted, “We apologize for the unfortunate experience. We are investigating the matter and will take immediate corrective action. At IKEA, we have the strictest guidelines when it comes to food quality as customer health and safety are something we care about deeply.”
We apologize for the unfortunate experience. We are investigating the matter and will take immediate corrective action. At IKEA, we have the strictest guidelines when it comes to food quality as customer health and safety are something we care about deeply.
— IKEAIndia (@IKEAIndia) September 1, 2018
This IKEA restaurant is their largest in the world with a seating capacity of nearly 1,000 people and it serves Swedish and Indian dishes both.
This is how Twitter reacted:
#1
WTF.. don't they have good processing manager? Didn't expect this from global giant
— பிரபு (Prabu) 🇮🇳 (@asmiprabu) September 1, 2018
#2
https://twitter.com/Kiran79139132/status/1035562791648866304
#3
Its very unfortunate . Most of the MNC food chains don't care about health safety . Its usual nowadays getting dis kind of news . @IKEAIndia
— SHANMUGASUNDARAM PONNUSAMY (@smartshan_87) September 2, 2018
#4
Please conduct surprise inspection at most of the known food joints. Also please check on the MRP of the water bottle in the invoice. Looks like a good case of differential pricing of similar product.
— Ankit (@ankit_gnlu) September 2, 2018
#5
https://twitter.com/imdeba0007/status/1036128902274400256
This is a matter of serious concern; hence, proper investigation should be carried out in this matter and the people who are responsible for this incident should be punished.
What do you have to say in this regard? Let us know.
