A team of Dehradun food safety department has seized four quintals of adulterated Petha sweet at Asharodi (Dehradun), which was brought to Dehradun from Chhutmalpur in Saharanpur on Saturday. The department officials ordered the suppliers to destroy the seized pethas.
Ahead of Diwali, a team consisting of four members has been deployed at various places in the district to inspect manufacturing units of sweets and the shops selling them to check the purity of the items, said Dehradun food safety officer Anoj Kumar Thapliyal on Saturday.
This is a routine business, given the fact that the quality of the sweets and other milk-produced items tend to go down considerably during the time of Diwali festivities when the demand peaks.
He said that the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 is enforced on all food business undertakings profit, non-profit, public and private carrying out any of the activities related to any stage of manufacture, processing, packaging, storing, importing, selling, transporting and distributing them.
He further said that with Diwali festival round the corner, some manufacturing units from Western Uttar Pradesh and other parts of the State supply adulterated sweets and milk items in the markets to earn profit despite knowing the fact that adulterated items are harmful to the people who consume them.
The team members have conducted special checking drives at Harbertpur, Vikasnagar, Rishikesh, Rispana bridge, Kolagarh and some other places of Dehradun city aside from Ajabpur Khurd, Rajpur, Sahaspur and places located along Chakrata Road for the past ten days.
Around 55 samples of adulterated items were collected from the manufacturing units by the team members so far this season in Dehradun. The department officials ordered the suppliers to destroy the seized adulterated items.
The officials are monitoring preparation techniques and also keeping a close watch over hygiene and precautions maintained by the manufacturers while preparing the sweets. The officials have been directed to take samples of milk and the by -products whose demand peaks during the festive season.
After collecting sampling, food items will be sent to Food and Drug Testing Laboratory (FDTL) based in Rudrapur to have their purity checked.
Thapliyal further said that in the past one year, the department had collected over 80 samples of food items, seized from the restaurants, milk dairies, shops and other manufacturing units in the district out of which some samples were found unsafe or sub-standard or misbranded or containing extraneous matters. Some cases relating to this have been pending in the court.
The penalty is imposed on food trade operators who are found manufacturing articles of food containing ingredients or substances harmful to health with no safety measures being taken in tune with the Act, he added.
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