Surrey restaurant forced to close due to odour complaints

Baba Chicken, a popular Surrey restaurant serving authentic Indian cuisine, was crushed by the abrupt termination of its lease this month.

On Dec. 19, the business owners and employees discovered their locks had been changed. A notice on the door posted by the property manager cited a persistent and pungent odour, allegedly emanating from the restaurant, that had been negatively impacting the neighbour, Envision Financial Services, for months.

Co-owner Bikram Nathowalia says the eviction couldn’t have come at a worse time.

“It’s the holiday season. I have 40 employees working for me full-time, and they’re out of a job,” Nathowalia said.

Property manager Value Property Group says it had been continuously communicating with Baba Chicken about the need to fix its ventilation system.

“On a number of occasions over the last year, it had been so bad that it had caused Envision to close their doors for the day,” said Value Property Group CEO Chris Andison.

“So if you can imagine, it’s like the exhaust coming from a commercial kitchen and ventilating out. And, unfortunately, it was essentially leaving their space and going right into the neighbouring space.”

But Nathowalia and his co-owner Vaninder Singh say they’ve cooperated every step of the way, doing everything that’s been asked.

“The grease trap has been installed, the ventilation has been cleaned. It’s supposed to be cleaned every six months, but I’m doing this every two months just to make sure that — I need to be a good neighbour,” said Singh.

Over the summer, Fraser Health conducted multiple routine facility inspections of Baba Chicken, with recent reports indicating no critical hazards from the restaurant.

“Today, if you call my food as an odour, that’s a disrespect to my community, to my food, to my culture,” said Nathowalia.

Andison says the group has hundreds of tenants from diverse cultural backgrounds.

“We’re in the business of working with our tenants — keeping them operating — and unfortunately, on very rare occasions, tenancies have to be terminated.”

Meanwhile, food purchased for a busy holiday season is spoiling in the closed restaurant, and Baba Chicken has been told to fully vacate the property by Jan. 9.