PANAJI
Top-notch South Goa restaurateur, Margarida Tavora, touched a raw nerve in the highest echelons of the Goa government with a Sunday afternoon post on a social media platform which articulated that a ‘formalin’ test using the Schiff’s reagent performed on a batch of locally bought sole fish (leppo) proved positive.
“Beware, we are still being poisoned despite the assurances given by the F&D dept,” said Tavora in her Facebook post, setting Goa’s Facebook community abuzz.
Tavora owns and personally operates the acclaimed ‘Fernando’s Nostalgia’ restaurant in Raia, Salcete, and by Sunday evening the viral post evoked a nervous response from Health Minister Vishwajit Rane, who has been struggling to cope with the raging ‘formalin-in-fish’ imbroglio since it first broke out on July 12 last. “I would like to appeal to people like Margarida Tavora that they should not try these tests with Schiff’s reagent to try and prove something which they are not aware of. They lack knowledge, lack information and we have already carried out serious amount of tests and told the people that they need to use the CIFT kits,” Rane said.
He said, the Schiff’s reagent tests all ‘aldehydes’ and is therefore not ideal to confirm the presence or absence of ‘formaldehyde’ in food samples. “I would like to appeal to her that what she is doing is creating misinformation and actually create fear in the minds of the people of Goa when this Schiff’s reagent test is not the one that has to be relied on,” Rane added.
Rane said since Saturday, FDA officers are assisting police at the Polem border check-post to identify insulated vehicles and those entering Goa for fish export processing, fish meal units and for domestic sales. The action will continue tonight and till Monday morning. Tavora, meanwhile, clarified on her FB timeline that it was not her, but a friend of her’s from Borda-Margao, who did the test.
The post and other versions of the post have gone viral on Goa-focused FB groups including “Goa Happening” with over 5000 members, “Asmeeta Group Goa” which has over 35,000 members, the “Konkani Speaks” group with over 20,000 members, besides innumerable shares on the Whatsapp platform.
The ‘formalin-in-fish’ imbroglio first broke out in Goa on July 12 last, when following a general missive from Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) a team of the FDA conducted pre-dawn test on fish samples drawn from 17 trucks at the Margao wholesale market.
Initial reports had said all the 17 samples tested positive for the deadly carcinogenic ‘Formalin’ and the episode blew up into a raging controversy within hours when local TV news channels flashed the results and hinted at pressure exerted on FDA’s Iva Fernandes, the ‘designated officer’ under Food and Safety Standards Act, to refrain from proceeding under the stringent law against the 17 ‘errant’ fish-importers.
Since then, the State government’s FDA machinery is struggling to cope with the herculean task of re-building the average Goan’s confidence about the safety of the fish sold in local markets.
Sunday’s buzz on social media, if anything, will only add to the government’s woes on the issue and as Rane himself told The Goan, “its back to square one.”
