Cloud kitchen compliance: the licence is the easy part

Which licence, and in whose name

The kitchen is the food business. Swiggy's or Zomato's licence covers the platform, not your premises, and the platform is required to display the seller's own number on the listing. That number has to belong to the kitchen the food is cooked in.

Multiple kitchens mean multiple licences — one per address — and if you operate kitchens in more than one state, the head office needs a Central Licence on top.

Several brands, one kitchen

Running four virtual brands out of one kitchen does not need four licences; it needs one licence for the premises, with the food categories that cover everything all four brands sell. Where it goes wrong is category drift — a brand launches a dessert or a packaged item that the licence does not list.

The four things that outlast the certificate

• Medical fitness of food handlers. Required annually under Schedule 4, and one of the first things an inspection asks to see.
• Water testing. Potable water used in the kitchen has to be tested at the frequency Schedule 4 sets, at a notified laboratory.
• A trained supervisor. FoSTaC requires one certified food safety supervisor for every 25 food handlers, trained through an FSSAI-empanelled partner.
• The annual fee, and the return if your kind of business owes one. Since March 2026, missing either can leave the licence deemed suspended — and a suspended number gets a listing pulled.

What actually gets a kitchen delisted

The trigger is usually not a hygiene score. It is a number that does not verify: a licence deemed suspended for a missed duty, a certificate whose address does not match the kitchen, or a brand operating under a licence held by a different entity.

All three are file problems, and all three are visible before the sweep if someone is looking.