NEW DELHI, 9 August 2003 — India ordered two state-run laboratories yesterday to check if Pepsi and Coca-Cola were selling soft drinks laced with pesticides as activists went on a bottle-smashing campaign.
The Health Ministry sent samples of soft drinks made by the two under-fire companies to the Central Food Technological Research Institute in southern Mysore and the Central Food Laboratory in Calcutta.
“Our tests will be done in independent labs and we will take action only after examining the results,” Health Minister Sushma Swaraj said, as various state administrations said they too will conduct their independent probes.
“The results are expected next week,” she said.
A private environment watchdog, the Center for Science and Environment (CSE), stirred up a storm by saying a study it conducted indicated a “deadly cocktail of pesticide residues” in 12 top brands marketed in India by Coca-Cola and Pepsi.
The CSE accused both companies of using polluted water.
The CSE report unveiled Tuesday said tests showed drinks sold by the Indian units of Coca-Cola and Pepsi contained dangerously high levels of the toxic chemicals lindane, DDT, malathion and chlorpyrifos. The CSE said repeated exposure to these pesticides could cause severe harm, ranging from cancer, liver and kidney damage, to birth defects.
Coca-Cola and Pepsi vehemently denied the allegations and took out advertisements yesterday in the Indian press to try to allay customer fears.
Shopkeepers reported a plunge in sales of both brands. Executives of the Indian units of Coca-Cola and PepsiCo refused to say what impact the report had on sales in the estimated $1.2 billion market, but outlets across India said the scare had widened.
“Despite the heat, our soft drink sales have dropped by half,” said D.K. Vaish, who runs a soft drinks stall in Lucknow, capital of Uttar Pradesh state. “Even children are staying away.”
In neighboring Bihar, sellers strung up banners outside shops saying, “We don’t sell poisonous Coke”.
“I used to sell at least 150 bottles every day,” said Bharat Kumar in the state capital Patna. “In the last two days, sales have dropped to 30 to 40.”
India, a country of a billion people, offers a huge market for soft drinks with per capita consumption still a low seven bottles a year.
Hundreds of Hindu activists vandalized a Coca-Cola office in Allahabad and attacked shops selling Coke and Pepsi. Supporters of two Hindu groups, Shiv Sena and Bajrang Dal, some of them armed with guns, forced their way into a Coca-Cola supply outlet and nearby shops and smashed hundreds of soft drink bottles.
Shouting “down with foreign companies,” around 45 activists tossed crates of drinks around the office, said R.P. Singh Chawla, the supply outlet owner. A television set, computers and other office equipment were damaged, he said.
In Bombay, the Shiv Sena took its “break bottle” campaign to the doorsteps of colleges in a bid to wean away students from their staple fizzy diet. Sena activists defaced posters at colleges that featured movie stars who endorse Coca-Cola and Pepsi products.
Activists from other parties including Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s BJP also smashed bottles of Coke and Pepsi outside Bombay’s busy Churchgate train station. “I am sure lots more bottles will break over this important health issue,” said BJP activist H.N. Dixit.
The warning was echoed by fellow demonstrator Aslam Sheikh, Bombay youth wing president of Samajwadi Party.
