FSSAI Prohibits Everest, Laljee Godhoo Hing Sales

FSSAI has prohibited the sale of compounded asafoetida made by Everest Food Products Private Limited and Laljee Godhoo and Company, finding the products misbranded and sub-standard, according to a report in Storyboard18. The prohibition applies with immediate effect till further orders, and is not stated as permanent.

The order cites the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011, and the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006. In the Everest findings as the report presents them, compounded asafoetida was recorded at 0.00% alcohol-soluble extract against a prescribed minimum of 5%. The report gives no further product name for that reading. Separately, FSSAI recorded Yellow Hing Powder at 3.29% and Black Hing Powder at 4.4% on the same measure.

The regulator also flagged labelling findings at Everest that sit apart from the hing prohibition: salt content above 5% not declared on Chicken Masala, Garam Masala and Egg Curry Powder, and spice content not declared on labels. Those are declaration issues, not an extension of the prohibition on compounded hing.

For Laljee Godhoo and Company, FSSAI found compounded hing in powder and lump forms misbranded and sub-standard, and recorded raw hing varieties A, B, C, D, E and F as containing starch above the 1% by weight limit the products were measured against.

Both companies have been directed to submit action plans correcting the identified malpractice and ensuring compliance with the 2006 Act. No penalty, fine or prosecution is stated in the report, and no response from either company appears in it.

The consequence runs past the two manufacturers. A prohibition with immediate effect means every marketplace and quick commerce listing carrying an affected SKU has to come down, and stock already in a dark store or a fulfilment centre has to be pulled and held. A seller who keeps a prohibited product live is exposed whoever made it, which is the reading we took from the Blinkit dark store licence suspension as well.

The practical move is unglamorous and rarely in place before it is needed: know which of the SKUs on your catalogue you did not manufacture, hold a manufacturer name against each one, and keep a route that pulls a listing in hours rather than at the next catalogue refresh. Landing a day after the front-of-pack warning label proposal, this order is a reminder that food compliance is moving on more than one front.