A survey of the dish as served by 66 Yorkshire takeaway outlets found that 27 per cent contained illegally high levels of artificial colour.

The findings were published by West Yorkshire Trading Standards and made headlines throughout UK newspaper and broadcast media.

Nearly all the curries were coloured with a cocktail of tartrazine (E102), sunset yellow (E110), ponceau 4R (E124), carmoisine (E122) and allura red (E129).

All these are targeted for phasing out by the The Food Standards Agency because of their harmful effects on children but there was no legal requirement for the takeaways to label the colours.

Researchers at Southampton University of Southampton have found evidence of increased levels of hyperactivity in young children consuming mixtures of some artificial food colours and the preservative sodium benzoate. Asthma, allergies, rashes, and gastric upsets have also been associated with the colourings.

The government’s Food Standards Agency has had some success in persuading food and drink manufacturers to stop using them. But Graham Hebblethwaite, West Yorkshire’s chief trading standards officer, said this was not the case with the takeaway curry trade.

The law currently allows curry sauces to contain up to 500mg/kg of artificial colour but one sample was found to contain five times this level.

Sweets are allowed to contain up to 300mg/kg of colour and the study showed the worst curry contained the colour equivalent of 3.6kg (8lb) of brightly coloured sweets.

Councillor Andrew Carter, of West Yorkshire Trading Standards Committee, said the guilty takeaways would be revisited and if they had not changed their ways they could be prosecuted.

Some restaurant owners have responded that they no longer use colouring.

One owner in Bradford said: “We don’t really use colouring at all. People have been phasing out the colouring for a while. The restaurants that use colouring have got a lot to hide in their food, but there are lots of top-quality restaurants where there is no problem. Colouring should be minimal.”

A little odd perhaps for one who seems so well-established on the UK entertainment and media scene.

But the “Who am I?” question that taxes so many children of immigrant families in the UK clearly still figures large in his thinking.

Hardeep, born to a family of Indian stock who settled in Glasgow, this month reports on a journey to India to further examine the British-Sikhi equation – or should that be British-Scottish-Sikhi-Indian equation?

He does it in a book, Indian Takeaway, and as he is a comedy scriptwriter it’s no surprise that it’s a lively read, but it is a thought provoking work as well, built as it is around some gently confrontational situations.

A runner-up on BBC1’s Celebrity Masterchef, Hardeep decided that he should extend his journey of self-discovery by cooking his way around India!

He served up very British meals for a variety of people. And placing before them such dishes as fish and chips, shepherd’s pie, cock-a-leekie soup and the traditional Sunday roast, had sometimes hilarious, sometimes humiliating, outcomes.

And what conclusions did he draw from these encounters and other experiences?
Well, I doubt that we are giving much away if we say that he did not return with the answers to the many uncertainties that lie just beneath the surface of modern British Sikhism. But it is a highly enjoyable traveller’s tale, with moving moments to cherish.

Father-of-two Hardeep made a name as co-writer of the Channel 4 comedy Meet the Magoons – and is much in demand as a contributor to BBC2’s Newsnight Review and numerous radio programmes including Radio 4’s Question Time.

Turban-clad, he’s makes a strong impression, sometimes improbably combining the turban with a kilt, a gesture that suggests he wants us all to consider the possibility that cultural differences can be that easily reconciled.

Food for thought – whether it be British, Scottish, Sikhi or Indian.

J.C.