Sunita Narayan, director of the New Delhi-based NGO, said "The government's own committee had found pesticides in the products". The Centre admitted before the Supreme Court on Wednesday that there were pesticide residues in colas produced and sold in India, according to her.

"We still believe that the government must agree on (fixing) the total amount of pesticide that should be in the soft drinks," Narayan said.

She cited the report of the N K Ganguly Committee, set up by the Centre to finalise the standards for soft drinks, saying the government should fix the pesticide limit.

"While we welcome the report of Ganguly Committee, it should put the matter to rest. Now its very clear that there are pesticides in soft drinks," Narayan said.  The CSE in its study titled "Soft Drinks, Hard Truth II", had said that soft drinks in Delhi contained high levels of pesticides.

It claimed that Pepsi contained 30 times more pesticide residue on an average and Coca Cola had 27 times higher compared to results in 2003. Referring to the clarifications issued by cola giants, she said we (CSE) have shown repeatedly that the companies don't follow any standards.

"This is why the government's own committee has found pesticides in the products," Narayan added.

"It's very clear that these companies have repeatedly put up film stars to cajole people and tell them that there are no pesticides in their product and they are safe," Narayan stated. She said CSE does not favour total ban on colas or soft drinks.

"We are asking the standards to be set up and benchmarking what is safe level of pesticide which we can be exposed to. We should understand that we have lot of pesticides in our food products and things that we eat but those are essential part of our diet," Narayan said.

"We should reduce pesticide from essential products while we must minimise pesticides from non-essential products like soft drinks," she added.

Reacting to film stars and cricketers endorsing cola products, she said they should keep in mind that they are not just brand ambassadors for companies but also role models.

"When they endorse the product they must be clear that these companies are not as clean as they say they are," she said.

Soft drinks, hard truths