Over 60 students fall ill at Kheda school, probe ordered into kitchen hygiene

Ahmedabad, Sep 5 (IANS) Panic gripped Gyanshakti Residence School in Matar taluka of Kheda district in Gujarat after more than 60 students complained of diarrhoea, vomiting, fainting and suffered from panic attacks.

The children were rushed to Kheda Civil Hospital in 108 ambulances on Thursday night, creating a scene of chaos in the hospital as doctors scrambled to treat them.

Preliminary checks by district authorities revealed unhygienic conditions in the school kitchen, where food was being prepared in dirty surroundings.

Flour and roti-making machines were reportedly not cleaned regularly, and dirty utensils were found lying next to food items.

Officials captured the state of the kitchen before and after it was hurriedly cleaned following their visit.

Senior officials, including the District Health Officer, District Primary Education Officer, and Kheda Mamlatdar, inspected both the school and hospital.

Food samples have been collected and sent for laboratory testing, with strict action likely against the school administration if negligence is proven.

While parents and locals accused the school of serious lapses and even attempting to suppress the incident, health officials played down fears of food poisoning.

“The effect of food poisoning is not visible. Only one child had normal vomiting and a few others showed mild seasonal symptoms,” said Health Officer V.S. Dhruv.

He added that if contaminated food had been the cause, a larger number of children would have shown severe reactions. The investigation is still on.

In the past year, Gujarat has seen a series of significant food-poisoning outbreaks across different settings.

In Dahod district, over 60 girl students at a residential school fell ill after dinner, presenting symptoms such as vomiting, nausea, and stomach pain.

At Maharaja Sayajirao University (MSU) in Vadodara, more than 100 female hostel students suffered from acute food poisoning after an evening meal, prompting hospitalisation. The contractor has since been blacklisted for lacking a valid food licence.

In Mehsana, 33 people fell ill after consuming ‘Kopra Pak’ at a local school event, with several hospitalised and samples sent for testing.

Historic outbreaks include Sudamda (Sayla), where over 300 —including many children — were affected by contaminated buttermilk offered as 'prasad', and in Gir Somnath, where 250 guests at a wedding were hospitalised after consuming tainted buttermilk.

On the regulatory front, the Gujarat FDCA conducted over 190 raids in 2024–25, seizing 351 tonnes of suspected substandard or adulterated food items worth ₹10.5 crore. Of the 60,448 samples tested, 1.45 per cent failed quality checks, and 0.17 per cent were deemed unsafe.

Enforcement actions included 980 adjudication cases and 87 court proceedings, and the state has ramped up testing infrastructure with new labs and mobile testing vans.

--IANS

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