Kendriya Vidyalaya No.

1, Bhubaneswar
(1st shift)

CHEMISTRY PROJECT
Name of the project: Adulteration of Food

Name: Sayan Rath

Class: XII
Sec: B
Roll: 34
Guided by: Ms. Garima Ghanghas

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 Acknowledgement

I would like to extend my sincere and heartfelt thanks towards

all those who have helped me in making this project. Without
their active guidance, help, cooperation and encouragement, I
would not have been able to present the project on time. I
extend my sincere gratitude to my Principal Mr A K Panda sir
and my Chemistry teacher Ms. Garima Ghanghas for their
moral support and guidance during the tenure of my project.

I also acknowledge with a deep sense of reverence, my

gratitude towards my parents and other faculty members
of the school for their valuable suggestions given to me in
completing the project.

Date:

Name: Sayan Rath Sign of the student

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 Certificate

This is to certify that Sayan Rath, student of class XII has

successfully completed the research on the project climate
change and its impact, under the guidance of Ms. Garima
Ghanghas (Chemistry teacher) during the year 2023-24.

Sign of Internal ______________________

Sign of Principal ______________________

Sign of External _______________________

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 Index
• Acknowledgement -i
• Certificate - ii

SL.NO. Contents Pages

1. Statement of Problem 5-6

2. Objectives 7

3. Introduction 8

4. Classification of Adulteration 9-10

And some data about it.

5. Experiments 11-16
• Methods & Procedure
• Materials/ Resources Required
• Observation

6. Analysis of Data and Discussion of 17

The Result and Conclusion

7. Limitation of The Study 17

8. Bibliography 17

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 Statement of Problem

It has been seen that many companies, traders & Shopkeepers

mix food adulterants in their products, so they can make more
profit out of them.

This causes many health issues like food poisoning to poor

immunity system to failure of organs and much more.

Even many news come about busting of adulteration units

& deaths caused by unfit foodstuffs.

Two of the recent ones are;

i. Spices adulteration unit busted in Cuttack’s Malgodown.

- Dated back – 21 July 2023
- source Otv (Odishatv.in)

The owner was allegedly mixing rice powder and colours to

the chilli powder.

In the investigation, it was found that the unit was preparing

adulterated red chilli powder, turmeric and other spices.

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 ii. Adulterated Sauce, Pickle Manufacturing Unit Busted In
Bhubaneswar
- Dated back - 06 April 2021
- source Otv (Odishatv.in)

In another major crackdown on food adulteration units in the

State, a joint squad of Odisha Police and Food Safety officials
busted an adulterated sauce and pickle manufacturing unit at
Pahal on the outskirts of the Capital City.

Now, you might be thinking why people do such things just for
money, but the bigger question is how? And if the adulterants
are really mixed in the foodstuffs, then how to detect them?
And if someone has consumed some adulterants then how to
cure him?

Well, the answers to these questions will be given in the

following pages.

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 Objectives

The project mainly focuses on the following things;

Ethical Objectives:
• To know why adulteration of foodstuffs is done.
• To make the consumers aware of this.
• To put a stop to the use of adulterants.

Experimental Objectives:
• To do some tests on a few samples to know if they contain
adulterants or not.
• To know how to cure a victim of adulteration.
Theoretical objectives:
• To get to know about different adulterants and their
usage.

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 Introduction

Why is Adulteration done?

The adulteration of foodstuffs has been observed over
centuries. The reasons are obvious, the perishable nature,
heterogeneity and huge production of certain food items have
always been tempting for dishonest traders. Stock limitation,
diversity of animal species and market price pressure also
encourage them to do so.
Some of the infamous cases like The China Gutter oil scandal,
the contamination of powdered infant milk in China, methanol
poisoning in Iran and Malasia etc. are all perfect examples of
this.

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 Classification of Adulteration of food
The adulteration of food is classified into 3 categories: -

▪ Adulteration to improve Physical and sensory properties.

▪ Food Substitution
▪ Organic and Synthetic Adulterants.

Adulteration to Improve physical and sensory properties;

• Artificial Ripening Agents

- To avoid loss the fruits are plucked before their
maturity and ripened with chemicals.
- e.g., Ethylene, Ethanol, Ethylene Glycol, Calcium
Carbide, etc
• Artificial colouring agents
- Traders mix natural or synthetic colours in the
foodstuffs to make them look fresh and good.
- Example of Natural colours: Chlorophyll, annatto
and caramel.
- Example of Synthetic colours: Rhodamine B,
Auramine, Methyl yellow, Congo red, Orange ii, etc.
• Preservatives
- To make the shelf life of foodstuffs longer.
• Growth Hormones
- They are used to trigger growth in fruits.
- E.g., Gibberellic acid, Alpha naphthyl acetic acid,
oxytocin, etc.
• Artificial Sweetening agents
- Chemicals are added to make sweet foods taste
sweeter.

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 • To improve food consistency
- Some fake/cheaper components are mixed with
foodstuffs to make it look perfect and more.
- E.g.,
o Addition of chalk powder in sugar.
o Addition of lead salt in chili powder.
o Addition of detergent to milk.

Food Substitution
• Substitution of species and tissue
- It’s the replacing of a reputed fish/meat species with
a cheap one.
• Substitution of protein Content
- Additional proteins are added to the foodstuffs to
increase the protein intake.
- Generally, compounds with high nitrogen
concentration are used as they can’t be
distinguished with the help of Dumas and Kjeldhal
methods.
• Substitution of fat content
- Like Fat substitution in milk as it’s costlier.
- Substitution of oil and fat content.
- Oils are adulterated with other oils.

Organic and synthetic Adulterants

• Illegal addition of organic acid, alcohols and esters is
reportedly seen in the market.
• Synthetic compounds and drugs are also reported.
• Like adulteration of milk with soymilk, fruit juices with
organic acids etc.

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 Experiments

To know how much adulteration is being done on the ground

level, we will need to conduct a few tests.

Experiment-1

Aim: To Detect the Presence of Adulterants in Fat, Oil and

Butter.

Apparatus Required: Test-tube, conc. H2SO4, acetic acid,

conc. HNO3.

Procedure: Common Adulterants present in ghee and oil dyes

and argemone oil.
These are detected as follows:

i) Adulteration of dyes in fat:

1ml of Fat was heated with a mixture of 1ml of conc.
H2SO4 and 4ml of Acetic Acid.
The Appearance of Pink or red colour indicated the presence
of dye in the fat.

ii) Adulteration of argemone oil in edible oils:

To a small amount of oil in a test-tube, a few drops of conc.
HNO3 was added and shaken well.
The Appearance of red colour in the acid layer indicated the
presence of argemone oil.

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Experiment-2

Aim: To detect the presence of Adulterants in sugar.

Apparatus Required: Test-tubes, dil. HCl.

Procedure: Sugar is usually contaminated with washing Soda

and other insoluble substances which are detected as follows:

i) Adulteration of various insoluble substances in sugar:

Take a small amount of sugar in a test-tube and shake it with
little water. Pure sugar dissolves in water but insoluble
impurities do not dissolve.

ii) Adulteration of chalk powder, washing soda in sugar:

To small amount of sugar in a test-tube, add few drops of HCl,
brisk effervescence of CO2 shows the presence of chalk
powder or washing soda in the given sample of sugar.

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Experiment-3

Aim: To detect the presence of Adulterants in samples of chill

powder, turmeric powder and pepper.

Apparatus Required: Test-tubes, conc. HCl, dil. HNO3, KI

solution.

Procedure: common adulterants present in chili powder,

turmeric powder and pepper are red coloured lead salts,
yellow lead salts and dried papaya seeds respectively. They are
detected as follows;

i) Adulteration of red lead salts in chili powder;

To the sample of chili powder, add dil. HNO3. Filter the
diluted Solution and add 2 drops of potassium Iodide solution
to the filtrate. Yellow ppt. indicates the presence of lead salts
in the chili powder.

ii) Adulteration of Yellow lead salts to the turmeric

powder;
To a sample of turmeric powder add conc. HCl. The
appearance of magenta colour shows the presence of yellow
oxides Lead in the Turmeric Powder.

iii) Adulteration of brick powder in red chili powder;

Add small amount of the given red chili powder in the beaker
containing water. Brick powder settles at the bottom while
pure chili powder floats over water.

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 Observations
In Exp-1,
i)

Sl.no Brand name Observation

1. Aashirvaad Svasti Pure No change in
Cow Ghee colour.
2. Local product A Pink colour
(Unbranded) appeared
3. Amul No change in
colour.
4. Local product B Pink colour
(Unbranded) appeared but with
less intensity.

ii)

Sl.no Brand name Observation

1. Fortune Kachi Ghani No change in
colour.
2. Patanjali No change in
colour.
3. An unbranded oil No change in
bought from a street colour.
hawker
4. An unknown brand’s oil Red colour
from a small local shop. appears.

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In Exp-2,
i)
Sl.no Brand name Observation
1. Bajaj Hindusthan Sugar All the sugar
dissolved.
2. Local sugar All the sugar
dissolved.

ii)
Sl.no Brand name Observation
1. Bajaj Hindusthan Sugar No sign of brisk
effervescence.
2. Local sugar Appearance of
brisk
effervescence.

In Exp-3,

i)
Sl.no Brand name Observation
1. Everest Red chili powder No Yellow ppt
formed.
2. Local red chili powder No Yellow ppt
bought from a famous formed.
local trader

ii)

Sl.no Brand Name Observation

1. Everest Turmeric powder No colour
appeared.

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iii)
Sl.no Brand name Observation
1. Everest Red chili powder All the chili
powder floated
on the water.
2. Local red chili powder All the chili
bought from a reputed powder floated
local trader on the water.

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 Analysis of Data and Discussion of The Result
and Conclusion
It’s found that most of the branded products don’t have
adulterants while some of the products bought from local
traders have such things (and in some at a disastrous amount).

Conclusion

So, it’s advisable to buy mostly from a reputable brand or

trader.
If any person finds such malpractices going on, he/she should
immediately report to the authorities.

Limitations of the project

It was done at a small scale, so the detection of adulterants was

also less.
Lack of much knowledge about this field like a professional
food safety officer would have.

Bibliography
We took the help of google to know more about adulteration
(about its types, reagents etc.)

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