Portsmouth Indian restaurant Paanchi stops takeaway in bid to protect staff from Covid-19

Authentic Indian-style establishment, Paanchi, has suspended operations in a bid to protect its staff.

The restaurant had initially switched to offering deliveries to people within the Portsmouth area but has now stopped.

Owner Shahriar Uddin felt that it was ‘the right thing to do’ as it was difficult to maintain social distancing with a 17-strong team.

He said: ‘Paanchi is a very busy takeaway, but it’s just one of those things.

‘You can’t put a value on life and if the government is telling us to stay home and here we are at work and there’s about 16 or 17 members of staff that work here it’s just the right thing to do.’

Shahriar had to take on three more members of staff to keep up with the eatery’s high demand after restaurants across the city closed their doors two weeks ago in the lockdown.

It was around then that the team started to phase out orders for collection to reduce social contact with customers.

Shahriar said: ‘It has got to a point where it just made sense to close, especially where we are coming to the peak of the virus.

‘The health and wellbeing of my staff is paramount.’

He posted a live video to the shop’s Facebook page, generating many well-wishes from customers.

The post read: ‘We have not taken this decision lightly and know that our service has been playing an important role to keep morale up.

‘We have been clear throughout this, that we would only continue to operate whilst it was safe for our employees as well as our customers.

‘We feel now is the time to make this decision of temporarily closing.’

Paanchi was one of the first places to offer contactless home delivery, meaning there was no cash involved and delivery drivers stayed within two metres of each customer.

The shop is due to open on May 29, but owner Shahriar said he will extend or bring this forward if needs be.

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