THE owner of a string of award-winning Indian restaurants has been charged with the manslaughter of a customer who suffered from a severe peanut allergy.

In a case - believed to be one of the first of its kind - Mohammed Khalique Zaman was charged with the manslaughter by gross negligence of Paul Wilson who died from anaphylactic shock after eating a takeaway.

The 38-year-old, who lived near Thirsk, North Yorkshire, bought the meal from The Indian Garden, Easingwold, in January 2014 - months before the introduction of a law requiring food businesses to provide allergy information on all unpackaged food.

Mr Wilson, who had a six-year-old son, had recently been promoted to deputy manager at the Oak Tree pub in Helperby, was found collapsed in his bathroom. Paramedics were unable to revive him.

After his death, his parents, Margaret and Keith, requested that all donations should be given to Allergy UK, to support both the research and allergy nursing of sufferers awaiting treatment.

There are only about ten recognised deaths from food allergies in the UK every year.

Mr Zaman, 52, also faces a charge of perverting the course justice and an employment offence under the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006.

North Yorkshire Trading Standards announced it had also served summonses on Mr Zaman for six offences under the Food Safety Act and food safety regulations.

All the prosecutions will be managed by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

He has run several other restaurants across North Yorkshire and York for more than 25 years, including the Jaipur Spice chain, which won the Best In Yorkshire award at the Bangladeshi Catering Association Awards in 2012 and 2013.

Peter Mann, head of the CPS complex casework unit, said following a 14-month investigation, it had concluded there was sufficient evidence, and that it was in the public interest to charge Mr Zaman.

He said: "This defendant has now been charged with serious criminal offences and has the right to a fair trial.

"It is extremely important that there should be no reporting, commentary or sharing of information online which could in any way prejudice these proceedings."

Mr Wilson's death came months another nut allergy sufferer, landscape gardener Derek Stephenson, 31, of Stanhope, Weardale, died after eating a chicken tikka curry from Memsahib Indian takeaway in Tow Law.

In December, his mother, Linda Brown, welcomed EU legislation, coming into force to make restaurants declare if their food contained allergens, such as nuts, milk, celery, gluten and soya.