Mango eaters have to be careful!

Mango is the king fruit of the season, but it comes with its downside too. According to Dr. V. Swaminathan, a prominent horticultural scientist, chemicals like calcium carbide, which are added to mangoes to ripen them may be harmful to health. The mangoes that are available early in the summer season may not be ripe enough and thus are not easily saleable. To make them ripe and succulent, traders are treating them with calcium carbide, a chemical that may induce cancer if used indiscriminately. In the chemical industry, calcium carbide is used to produce acetylene gas (for wielding and cutting metal) and calcium cyanamide which is used in fertilisers. The fruit ripened artificially with the chemical has a distinct flavour and though it may look ripe from the outside, it is usually very tough from the inside. The mango may also have a white covering which is invisible to the naked eye. The mangoes may have an unnatural colour (very dark yellow), with greenish patches. They may also rot very early and give off a foul odour. Horticulture experts suggest that more traditional methods of ripening like fumigation etc. may be less harmful and are more health friendly, though they may take a longer time. Artificially ripened fruits may cause infections like gastroenteritis, which may be potentially life threatening. It might be better to go with the popular idiom, “All that glitters is not gold” and wait for naturally ripened mangoes than go for the artificially glittering but health-harming variety.

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