Officials believe a foul-smelling tomato rice and flavoured water offered at Hindu temple in Karnataka was contaminated.<\/p>\n
Ariana News Agency-<\/em><\/strong> Eleven people have died after eating rice that had likely been contaminated with a toxic substance at a Hindu temple ceremony in India, a health official said.<\/p>\n Another 29 people were critically ill and undergoing emergency treatment across various hospitals in Mysore, a city in the southern state of Karnataka.<\/p>\n \u201cEleven people have died so far and 93 others are hospitalised,\u201d said KH Prasad, the health officer for Chamraj Nagar district where the temple is located.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is likely that some toxic substance got mixed with the rice. The samples have been sent for forensic testing,\u201d Prasad said.<\/p>\n The patients were being treated for vomiting, diarrhoea and respiratory distress, Prasad added.<\/p>\n According to the police, devotees had gathered in large numbers at the Kicchukatti Maramma temple for the consecration ceremony on Friday, after which rice was served as a sanctified offering.<\/p>\n Murugappa, a devotee who was present at the temple, said they were offered tomato rice and flavoured water.<\/p>\n \u201cA foul smell was emanating from the food, but those at the head of the queue consumed the food nonetheless,\u201d he was quoted as saying by the NDTV news network.<\/p>\n \u201cA little while later they started vomiting and frothing at the mouth.\u201d<\/p>\n State Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy expressed grief over the incident and announced a compensation of 500,000 rupees each, or around $7,000, to the families of the victims.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Officials believe a foul-smelling tomato rice and flavoured water offered at Hindu temple in Karnataka was contaminated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_mat_hreflang_tags":[],"addvideo":"","video_duration":"","farsit":"","target":"0","top_stories":"0","top":"0"},"categories":[305],"tags":[333,68,332],"class_list":["post-1273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-asia","tag-hindu-temple","tag-india","tag-toxic-rice"],"acf":{"myctype":"change","target":false,"top_stories":false,"top":false,"farsit":""},"yoast_head":"\n