How clean is pani in pani puri, Bombay High Court asks BMC
Are Mumbaikars eating street food prepared using non-potable water? Is the ‘pani’ in the pani puri you have on the roads of Mumbai sourced from wells which do not supply potable water? – these are questions which the Bombay High Court has posed to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).
Terming it a very serious issue, a division bench of Chief Justice Manjulla Chellur and Justice GS Kulkarni on Friday asked the civic body to file an additional affidavit explaining its stand on whether water tankers which mostly provide water to street vendors in south Mumbai area, draw the water from wells, and if there was any regulation on their supply.
The bench asked the question after going through the affidavit filed by an officer of the Insecticide Branch of the Public Health Department of the BMC, Rajan Naringekar, who said that to avoid mosquito breeding in the wells across the city, the civic body stocks guppy fishes in them. Water is only allowed to be drawn from wells for non-potable purposes like cleaning and gardening, and only to those who have proper permissions, the affidavit stated.
However, the bench said that tankers mostly draw water from these wells and that they are the …read more