alt Hacker NewsThe problem with India is hygiene, not so much safety. The food might be great but you're practically guaranteed to get Delhi-Belly. I visited for work years ago, didn't eat any street food and was still taken out of action for 3 days. Rubbish is strewn everywhere, any standing water stinks. I don't think visiting again is worth the risk.
Every Indian I've ever met has been lovely though (except for the ones who try to scam call my mother)
But like you said, if it works for them who am I to disagree.
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Can confirm... Was flying back home and during a layover in Mumbai I grabbed some food from the food court. It was only after having sat down and eaten most of my food when I noticed that there were pigeons roosting directly above where my meal was purchased from, with their poop stains dribbling down the raised walls directly above the food. That was a particularly rough set of flights back home, but I lucked out and had a fairly empty flight for one leg of it that offered a full row of empty seats for me to lay down in and disassociate from the pain on.
(for anyone who is unaware, the airports - the ones I passed through, at least - in India are fairly open air, so birds were a common sight within them)
I think it was Anthony Bourdain who said pretty accurately that it's far safer to eat street food than restaurant food as street food is freshly cooked, hot and instantly sold while restaurant food might be sitting in a broken fridge over a weekend.
For me, it was really the water that was problematic, as opposed to the food.
On my first visit, I was careful about the water I drank, but not very careful about other ingestion, and I got TD about halfway through the trip.
On the next visit, I was careful to keep my mouth closed while showering, and only use bottled water to clean my toothbrush, etc. Everyone else on the trip, eating the same food, got sick, but I didn't.
This is of course anecdata, but generally food, especially cooked food, is more likely to be safe.