Ongole: 20 fall sick after eating at restaurant

Ongole: About twenty people fell sick and a few of them were hospitalised after eating at the Barkaas Arabic Restaurant franchise in Ongole on Sunday night announced the officials in Ongole on Tuesday.

The restaurant, a franchise of the Arabic food restaurant chain that has branches in Mangalagiri, Vijayawada, Guntur, Eluru, Rajahmundry, Kakinada, and other places, was a hit locally immediately after its launch in the town. The hotel, which was famous for large plate serving, was recently reopened after the lockdown.

The gazetted food inspector Ramayanam Nageswaraiah said that they received a complaint on Monday evening from one of the victims, Shaik Khadar Basha and the local tahsildar Chiranjeevi. He said that the victims claimed to have eaten chicken and fish dishes at the restaurant on Sunday night and suffered from vomiting, motions, and nausea in the night and few of them joined the hospital on Monday afternoon as the situation deteriorated.

He said that a food inspector and the tahsildar inspected the restaurant and primarily suspects that food poisoning occurred due to the fish and water. He said that the restaurant had information of the food poisoning by the afternoon and might have removed the stale food if any, but collected samples only with the available food prepared on Monday, instead of the food of Sunday as they received a late complaint. Further action will be taken on the restaurant after the test results of the samples were received, the food inspector added.

One of the victims Khadar Basha said that he along with six of his family members went to the restaurant and all of them fell sick by night. He said his colleagues also came to the restaurant at the same time and they were also suffered from the same symptoms. He said after receiving treatment from a local RMP, most of the 20 people went home, but six of them joined in two private hospitals as their condition was serious. The tahsildar Chiranjeevi warned the restaurants in the town to serve quality food to the customer or face stringent action against them.

However, Srinivas Duvva, partner of the Ongole franchise of Barkaas said that they serve quality food to the customers. He said that they serve fish supplied by the franchisor and packaged drinking water only. He also said that there was confusion over the number of patients, and he was trying to meet the customers to know what they ordered exactly and what went wrong.