FSSAI can stop kuttu atta outbreaks this Navratri. It must test early
A packet of kuttu atta will go into the trolley this week, along with singhara atta and a bag of sabudana, all bought loose from the stall a family has trusted for years. Sharad Navratri begins on October 11. Six months ago, kuttu atta put nearly 50 people in hospital in Uttar Pradesh’s Baghpat and Bijnor on the first day of the spring festival.
Trust, during a fast, is not really a choice. It is the only option a ritual leaves you, and the record shows how often it is tested.HOW OFTEN HAS THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENED?
More often than one unlucky year could explain. In April 2011, on the first day of Navratri, more than 200 people in east and northeast Delhi landed in four hospitals after eating food made from adulterated kuttu atta. Police said the victims had bought unpacked flour from local shops, and traced much of it to a single mill.
In March 2024, around Maha Shivratri, nearly 500 people fell ill across Delhi-NCR, including about 200 students in two Greater Noida hostels. That October, more than 120 people in Bijnor's Chandpur area were hospitalised on the first day of Navratri.
On September 23, 2025, around 200 people were treated in northwest Delhi, with more than 350 suspected cases reported. On March 19 this year, over 18 people in Baghpat, among them an additional district magistrate, and about 30 in Bijnor fell ill after eating kuttu preparations.
Those are only the outbreaks big enough to make the news. The symptoms, vomiting, diarrhoea, stomach pain and dizziness, barely change from one report to the next.WHY DO KUTTU ATTA AND SABUDANA KHICHDI MAKE PEOPLE ILL?
The fasting foods fail in different ways, and I think that matters. Kuttu and singhara flours are milled in small batches, sold loose and unlabelled, and spoil quickly when stored in damp godowns between festivals. After the 2025 outbreak, investigators named adulteration, contamination during processing or transport, and improper storage as possible causes, with laboratory results pending.
Sabudana khichdi carries a different risk, and it begins after the cooking. Bacillus cereus, a bacterium that thrives in cooked starchy food left at room temperature, is a recognised cause of food poisoning, and one of its toxins, the one behind vomiting, survives reheating. A large pot of khichdi made in the morning for a day-long fast fits that description. This is a hazard food science recognises, not an outbreak anyone has traced to a particular pot.WHY DOES TESTING ONLY BEGIN AFTER PEOPLE FALL ILL?
Read the aftermath of those outbreaks and the order of events barely changes. In 2011, Delhi's health minister ordered samples lifted in large numbers once the hospitals had filled. After Bijnor in 2024, kuttu atta from local shops was collected for testing following the hospitalisations.
In 2025, flour was collected from markets after the patients had already arrived. This March, the day after the first admissions, officials in Baghpat were still trying to trace the source and collecting samples from suspect shops.
In each case, sampling came second. Routine checks do exist, but I could find no publicised pre-Navratri drive aimed at fasting flours.DO STATES ALREADY TEST BEFORE FESTIVALS?
They do, for other foods. Maharashtra's Food and Drug Administration ran a four-day festive crackdown from September 17 to 20, inspecting 64 establishments and seizing or destroying more than 32,000 kilograms of suspect food. In late August, Odisha's food safety officials across 30 districts collected 475 samples for laboratory analysis during a festival-season drive.
Both show that a sweep timed to the calendar is something state departments already know how to run. For fasting flours, moisture, mould, microbial load and adulterants are the obvious starting points, and the exact panel is a question for laboratories.WOULD PACKAGING AND LABELLING MAKE LOOSE FLOUR SAFER?
Nishant Swami Hulle, assistant professor at Tezpur University, says the risk begins with loose sale. "In loosely sold flours, there is always a chance of adulteration and contamination," he told India Today Digital. An open sack also stays exposed to its surroundings, and humidity, airborne contaminants and stray light can speed up reactions that degrade a flour.
Packaging with proper labelling, he said, would help in two ways. A printed shelf life tells a buyer how old the flour is, and a label allows a product to be traced if people fall ill. That second point matters. In 2025, early enquiries pointed to a market in Adarsh Nagar, but the source was not formally confirmed. Dr Hulle also suggested that vendors could arrange safer storage themselves, through controlled-environment storage and pest control.
Who pays for packaging is a fair question in a market of small sellers, and it is one reason to start with the largest millers and wholesalers.WHAT CAN SHOPPERS DO IN THE MEANTIME?
Officials in Baghpat urged the public this March to buy reliable, pre-packaged flour, and a packet at least carries a manufacturing date and a seller who can be traced. Buy only what the household will use within the nine days, set aside flour that smells musty or sour or shows lumps or mould, and cook sabudana khichdi in small portions that are eaten fresh. If anyone feels unwell after a fasting meal, see a doctor at once.
Between now and October 11, mandis across north India will move a great deal of kuttu and singhara. That is the window in which a test can still protect someone, and in which a public advisory on cooked sabudana can still reach a kitchen. After the first hospital admission, it can only explain what went wrong.
Radifah Kabir is a food and biotechnologist.- Ends
Radifah Kabir tries to make the universe slightly less mysterious as Senior Sub-Editor at India Today’s Science Desk. A lifelong lover of physics and mathematics, she has spent four years (and counting) translating complex physics papers into English, chasing scientists for interviews, and writing explainers that don’t put readers to sleep. Off-duty, her heart belongs to Lana Del Rey's melodies, Quentin Tarantino's films, poetry, the Star Wars universe, good English movies, series and books, and one very demanding cat.
