36 passengers fall ill as IRCTC serves stale bread on Shatabdi Express

The food served onboard Shatabdi Express.

Thirty-six passengers onboard the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Shatabdi Express complained of health issues, after consuming rotten bread which was served to them. Despite pointing it out, the staff continued to serve the stale bread.

"The staff of Shatabdi Express - 12009 deliberately served expired food products during the meals, despite pointing it out to them. The authorities do not care about our health issues," said Amit Rane, a Kandivli resident, who was onboard.

An IRCTC spokesperson said the affected passengers were attended to by Railway doctors at Surat. He said a fine of Rs 2 lakh has been imposed on the contractor with a notice for termination and the on-board supervisor of the train was suspended.

Subhash Gupta, member of National Railway Users Consultative Committee said, "This is callousness of the railways, as they continued to offer the bread despite passengers pointing to its quality. Bread is not an expensive thing to be bought. IRCTC needs to improve their working culture," he said.

Meanwhile, Western Railway chief public relations officer, Ravinder Bhakar, said, "The Mumbai division has refunded an amount of Rs 2,880, the catering sub-component of the fare, for 36 passengers, which comes to around Rs80 per passenger."

In addition, samples of other food material served on the train have been collected and sent to laboratories accredited to National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories for further testing.

Catch up on all the latest Crime, National, International and Hatke news here. Also, download the new mid-day Android and iOS apps to get the latest updates