The High Court on Friday directed the government that Food Safety Commissioner should be in place within six weeks.
Hearing a Public Interest Litigation against food-adulteration, a division bench of Chief Justice Badar Durrez Ahmed and Justice Alok Aradhe held that the whole affairs of the commissioner’s post shall be completed within six weeks.
The direction came after Amicus curie, Bashir Ahmed Bashir submitted that in keeping with earlier court order, the government couldn’t create a post in 37 days.“ What kind of mockery is this? How are they working?,” he said.
Additional Advocate General MI Dar stated that the proposal for the creation of post has been cleared by Finance Department but the department has not cleared the proposal of additional staff.
The court directed Finance Department to clear the proposal of additional staff within a week. Expressing its dismay as to why the Food Safety Commissioner was not appointed yet, the court said: “How the government is working without its staff. “The proposal be placed before cabinet for final approval and be processed immediately,” it said.
The state counsel informed the court that before an application could be made for accreditation under National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL) for state’s two food testing labs, imparting of training to food analysts was a must.
He said application for accreditation was sent to the board and two food analysts were deputed for training, one for Kashmir and another for Jammu. He also said that for checking the labeling of the products, special drives have been undertaken in accordance with Food Safety and Standard Act.
The state counsel further told the court that there are seven mobile labs-- three for Kashmir, three for Jammu and one for Leh. The court however sought a fresh status report on functioning of these labs.
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