A shocking case of hurting religious sentiments of a Hindu passenger has come to light near the New Delhi Railway Junction inside the Indian Railways. Notably, the customer was delivered non-vegetarian food during the holy month of Shravan under the sticker of veg special thali he had ordered. Enraged by the act of the e-catering vendor, the passenger shared the incident on social media and also registered a complaint with the Indian Railways.
Acting on his complaint, the Railways penalised the vendor as per their fine policy. The outlet of the vendor has also been deactivated till an inspection is carried out to check their packaging and delivery mechanism. An apology has also been extended to the passenger for deviation in the order and he has been ensured that such mistakes won’t be repeated in future.
Delivered non-veg in Shraavan instead of the veg thaali I ordered.
— Pallav Singh (@pallavserene) August 9, 2024
Vendors bringing bad name to @IRCTCofficial @RailMinIndia?
Service: Zoop
Vendor: Sagar Bar Be Que
Owner: Faiz
Delivered by: Shahbuddin
PNR: 2910666828
Disgusted.🙏 pic.twitter.com/RyJGzJ7e6U
Taking to X, the aggrieved vegetarian passenger, Pallav Singh, informed that he had ordered a vegetarian thali but the e-catering delivery guy named Shahbuddin Qureshi served him non-vegetarian food in the holy month of Shravan. However, ‘veg spl thali (vegetarian special thali) sticker was pasted on the thali that had non-vegetarian food.
The incident took place in train number 12556 near New Delhi Junction (NDLS) – the delivery station. According to the details shared in the complaint, the name of the delivery service is Zoop and the passenger ordered the thali from Sagar Bar Be Que which is owned by a man named Faiz, as per the information shared by the vendor during the payment for the thali.
— Pallav Singh (@pallavserene) August 9, 2024
Taking note of the complaint, the Indian Railways commented on the post saying, “Your complaint has been registered on RailMadad and complaint no. has been sent through SMS on your mobile no.”
Your complaint has been registered on RailMadad and complaint no. has been sent through SMS on your mobile no. You may track your complaint via this link https://t.co/l5xDpG8Ncv
— IRCTC (@IRCTCofficial) August 9, 2024
However, the Indian Railways later submitted closing remarks in this incident in which it informed that it let off the miscreant vendor by only giving him a warning. It also added that it has given a full refund to the customer for “deviation of meal”.
— Pallav Singh (@pallavserene) August 9, 2024
In the closing remarks, the Indian Railways said, “Full amount has been refunded against deviation of meal. Vendor has also been taken up suitably and strictly warned to be more vigil during food packaging and to avoid such complaint in future or else strict action will be initiated.”
However, this is not a one off incident where a Hindu customer shared a complaint of receiving non-veg adulterated food, hurting their religious sentiments. Earlier, several shocking cases emerged from Indian railways, airways or famous snack delivering eateries in several parts of the country.
Earlier this week, on 4th August 2024, Chaos broke out at the city bus stop after non-vegetarian biryani was served to pilgrims who were returning to Delhi from Haridwar via Kandhla after taking Gangajal. The accused hawker named Tanveer was apprehended by authorities, and he was subsequently brought to the police station.
In April, this year, Gujarat Police raided a Vadodara-based samosa shop, ‘Huseni Samosa center’, and arrested six persons, including eatery owners Yusuf and Naeem Sheikh for selling samosas stuffed with beef. A similar case was reported in Pune, Maharashtra where condoms, stones and tobacco were found stuffed inside samosas in the canteen of Tata Motors. The police have registered an FIR against 5 people in this case. It was revealed that the accused – Rahim Shaikh, Azhar Shaikh, Mazar Shaikh, Azar Shaikh and Vicky Shaikh – committed the crime in anger after the company cancelled their contract.
In January 2024, a vegetarian passenger hailing from the Jain community, was served chicken pieces in her veg meal on an Air India flight. Enraged, she complained about the same to the cabin crew but no action was taken on the matter. Finally the passenger, Veera Jain, shared the incident on social media. Air India responded to her post on X, and requested her to delete the tweet.
In July 2022, an incident surfaced at the Jamia Millia Islamia University of Delhi, in which a vegetarian student was allegedly served a non-vegetarian sandwich in the varsity’s central canteen. Upon complaining to the canteen staff, the student was shoved aside and told that there is no pure vegetarian food available in the canteen.
Similar complaint had emerged from the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) in December 2018 where it was alleged that vegetarian food was being served after being cooked in oil used to prepare non-vegetarian dishes.
Additionally, there have been numerous cases where the customers received adulterated foods that were contaminated with dead rats, cockroaches etc in their fooding items.
India has the largest percentage of vegetarians in the world, and one of the most important feedback we’ve gotten from them is that they are very particular about how their food is cooked, and how their food is handled.
— Deepinder Goyal (@deepigoyal) March 19, 2024
Incidentally, in March 2024, food delivery aggregator Zomato gave up with the idea of starting a new service ‘Pure Veg Mode’ to serve its pure veg customers to mitigate the complaint and criticism from ‘pure veg’ users who had at times found non-veg items on their food order.
