Non-government organisation Centre for Science and Environment, which detected high level of harmful pesticide in 12 popular cola brands including Coca-Cola and Pepsi, on Thursday ridiculed the findings of two prestigious foreign laboratories.
The CSE reaction came a day after the Joint Parliamentary Committee submitted its report in Parliament approving the CSE findings. The JPC also suggested making laws to regulate soft drinks and other food products.
Soft Drinks, Hard Truths: Complete Coverage
Addressing a press conference in New Delhi, CSE director Sunita Narain said Coke and PepsiCo that controls the Rs 6000 crore (Rs 60 billion) soft drinks market in India tried to discredit the CSE and its findings by taking help of foreign labs.
In a series of advertisement released by Coke and Pepsi, the companies said two highly prestigious labs - TNO of the Netherlands and CSL of London - had concluded that the CSE findings were wrong.
The CSE report released in August last year said the sum of all pesticides in the PepsiCo brands added up to 0.0180 mg/l, 36 times higher than the European Union norm. The Coca Cola brands had 0.0150 mg/l of all the pesticides, 30 times more than the same EU limit.
This, the NGO said, was harmful to the consumers. There is no law to regulate the content in soft drinks in India. Industries say 89 per cent of the content is water, 10 per cent sugar and 0.5 per cent other concentrates.
The CSE findings led to a major controversy drastically reducing the sale of these brands and also the formation of a parliamentary body led by Member of Parliament Sharad Pawar to investigate the allegations.
Launching a series of offensive and even a court case against CSE, the two corporate giants said the NGO's findings were wrong and the companies adhered to international norms, adding since the CSE was a non-accredited lab its findings should not be considered genuine.
But the JPC report after having interaction with the CSE, Coke, PepsiCo and five Indian labs gave full marks to the CSE findings.
To this, Narain said: "Either all Indian labs are wrong or the two foreign labs are wrong. How can all Indian labs find pesticide content in the soft drinks and the foreign labs could not? If they are right then all Indian labs are wrong."
"The colonial, British leftover mindset was used by these companies to misguide the people. They projected whatever foreigners said was right."
Government-owned Central Food Laboratory in Kolkata and Central Food and Technical Research Institute in Mysore and private institutions CSE and Central Pollution Control Board in Delhi and Bangalore's Sri Ram Labs conducted research on the soft drinks.
According to the JPC report, all of them found pesticides in the soft drinks but the quantity of pesticide content varied in all these labs. The difference was due to the samples taken from different places and manufactured at different months of the year, said Narain.
Earlier, Health and Family Welfare Minister Sushma Swaraj had given clean chit to the cola industries on the basis of preliminary investigations.
Narain said: "I don't want to say anything on that. It is a six-month old matter."
She alleged multi-national companies Coke and PepsiCo provided safe and pesticide-free products in developed countries (eg. the US) but did not bother about quality norms in India.
"They are adding caffeine as an addictive in the soft drinks sold in India. It is strictly banned in countries like Australian, China and Canada. These countries have stringent laws pertaining to quality and safety," she said.
She said since the basic content of soft drinks is water (89 per cent), the manufacturers should be made to pay for this.
Praising the JPC report, Narain said it was vindication of the democratic values of India.
"We demand the government make stringent laws to regulate bottled water, soft drinks and all other food products," said Narain.
She demanded that there should be laws clearly setting norms for the final products and not just the raw material used in it -- be it soft drinks, fruit juices or sweetened water.
Narain said the Bureau of Indian Standards -- that sets norms for food products in India -- wants a common norm for soft drinks, fruit juices and sweetened water for the permissible level of pesticide content.
She said: "If you club together all these products and make a common norm then it will be of no use. The norms that fruit juices can follow would be impossible for colas and vise versa. So a common norm would be impractical and unfeasible."
"Therefore, we demand separate laws for all these products."
CSE demanded that India should have right to clean water and all municipalities should ensure that they provide clean and safe water to the consumers.
Before taking on the soft drinks, the CSE had found pesticide content in bottled water. Reacting to the findings, the government finally made laws to regulate bottled water. It came into force on January 1 this year.
Narain said the European Union norms for water could be acceptable in India but the country should have its own norms for food products.
She said: "We should have our own laws according to diet and consumption of particular food products in India. We cannot have the EU norms because they have been made keeping in mind the consumption pattern in other countries."
Reacting to the criticism made by soft drink companies, she said: "We never targeted Coke and Pepsi. We targeted soft drinks. It is coincidence and quite surprising that the entire soft drink market in India is controlled by just two companies."
"We will continue our movement and hope the government will seriously consider the JPC report and make stringent health-based laws."
