It is without doubt that anyone and everyone would want to live or eat in a very hygienic condition, may it be indoors or outdoors. But if one takes a look at the streets everywhere in Goa, one would see eateries like restaurants, shacks, food stalls galore. The million dollar question is how hygienic are our Goan food eateries. The heart of every restaurant is the kitchen. How clean and hygenic are the kitchens of local restaurants or even shacks? When one visits a local restaurant and has a peep in the kitchens, 95% would be in a pathetic state.
There are videos gone viral showing rats on pastries, cockroaches on other food items, etc. Life goes on and there is no one to look into these pathetic restaurant kitchens.
Whenever I enter a restaurant may it be in Vasco, Panjim or Margao, I always have a habit to have a glance at the kitchens and the operations and most kitchens are in a sorry state.
Few weeks back the Department of Metrology raided various shops for tempering with scales and measures. Similarly I wonder if restaurants have ever been raided by health inspectors.
Its high time they visited these pathetic restaurants and had a tour around their kitchens. With restaurants charging exorbitant rates on their menu’s, everyone visiting such restaurants have the right for clean food cooked under hygienic conditions.
And about the food gaddas by the road side serving ras omelettes or any other snacks, these gaddas must also be checked for their hygiene practices which can easily contribute for food poisoning. It has become a way of life for people to eat at such gaddas whereby neglecting to observe the hygienic practices.
Its time the health inspectors pull up their socks and start having a random checks and act accordingly. Having never heard of such health inspectors raiding restaurants, it makes me wonder if they are taken care of by giving them their weekly or monthly hafta, thus keeping them at bay.
Our health minister, while keeping an eye on improving hospitals, should also take the restaurants, hotels and every eatery into consideration which provide food for public but which can also be a hazard to public health.
