Kolkata Mall Asks Woman To Breastfeed Her Baby In Toilet, Issues Unconditional Apology After Outrage

A woman trying to breastfeed her 7-month-old baby at the South City mall in Kolkatta was allegedly asked by its employees to do it in a washroom, triggering outrage on the social media following which the mall authorities expressed regret and offered an apology.

The woman, Abhilasha Arup Das Adhikari, while reviewing the Facebook page of the mall wrote that the mall had "no place to breastfeed", while adding that the mall staff had told her to breastfeed her baby in the toilet.

“First, I asked a member of the cleaning staff on the first floor and was told that there was no baby-care room on that floor. I went to the second floor and again asked a staff member near the washroom if there was a place there where I could feed my child. There was none. I went inside the washroom and almost puked,” said Adhikari, while recounting her ordeal, according to a report in The Telegraph.

Adhikari, 29, who is a speech therapist said she lives in Behala, which is several kilometres away from the mall.

After she narrated her ordeal, the mall initially responded in a nonchalant manner, saying,  the mall is "meant for shopping" and asked the mother of an infant to "do your home chores at your home".

"Funny you found this to be an issue because breastfeeding is not allowed on the floor for a number of reasons..... this big place that we have is meant for shopping(.) so with all due respect madam please make sure you do your home chores at your home and not in the mall or at least plan it before hand," the mall's management replied in a post.

This further enraged Adhikari, and others who had by now begun to follow the episode on social media, leading to outrage against the mall authorities for their insensitivity and brazen response. 

Later, the mall authorities deleted the shrill response and came out with another saying "Breastfeeding is not allowed on the floor in public area. We can make arrangements but we apologise our staff told you to do that in the washroom which we are sorry about."

They said the initial response was posted by the agency deputed to manage the mall's Facebook page and action is being taken against it.

"We have provision for baby changing/feeding room, kids toilet etc on every floor. Unfortunately as the mall is not fully operational and partly under renovation, all services are not active. But 1 baby changing room on 1st level along with kids toilet is available," the mall authorities said in another post the next day.

However, despite the repeated apologies by the mall authorities, on social media at least, the mall continues to get disparaging comments for the incident.

(with inputs from PTI)