‘Someone brought drugs to office’: Zomato's banana chips post causes uproar, company apologises

Zomato, a food delivery company, has apologised for a tongue-in-cheek social media post that appeared to make light of drug use, prompting widespread criticism from netizens.

The post, which was intended to be humorous, featured a photo of a packet of banana chips placed on a desk at its office. Next to it was a computer screen with “HELPPP!!!” typed out in jumbo font size. “Hello @gurgaonpolice someone brought drugs to office,” Zomato wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

While posting a screenshot of the post, X user Ravi Handa criticised Zomato for what he mentioned as “irresponsible behavior from a listed company”.

“They should not be tagging police handles just to score some likes or RTs on social media. Now someone from Gurgaon Police will have to respond to this and waste resources which could be better used elsewhere,” he wrote.

Zomato responded after an hour, agreeing with his points of view. The food delivery company apologised for the "irresponsible and unnecessary" message.

“Hi Ravi, you’re right. Reading it from another lens, we realised it’s an irresponsible and unnecessary tweet. We’ve taken it down and sincerely apologise,” Zomato’s customer support handle wrote.

Known for their quick wit, Zomato's social media team uses tongue-in-cheek humor to engage with current trends and events.

This is not the first time Zomato has landed in a soup for its social media posts. After facing massive backlash recently, Zomato took down its controversial World Environment Day ad on June 8. The ad which was released on Environment Day on June 5, featured actor Aditya Lakhia, better known for playing the role of ‘Kachra’ in the movie Lagaan.

The ad's centrepiece was a play on the word Kachra (trash), suggesting comparisons between the character's name in the film and plastic garbage. 

Under fire from the ire of netizens, Zomato issued an apology that said, “On World Environment Day, our intent was to spread awareness about the potential of plastic waste and benefits of recycling in a humorous way. Unintentionally, we may have hurt the sentiments of certain communities and individuals. We have taken down the video.”

Last year, an ad starring Hrithik Roshan was removed after many people accused it of offending religious sensibilities. 

Meanwhile, Zomato recently landed in hot water after one of its employees told a customer that everyone should know Hindi as it is the national language. The customer, Vikash, had complained to Zomato about not receiving a refund for a missing item in his order. The Zomato employee, who was responding to Vikash's complaint, told him that he should learn Hindi as it is the national language.

This incident sparked outrage on social media, with many users accusing Zomato of promoting Hindi jingoism and language discrimination. Zomato apologised for the statement.

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