Sale of adulterated sweets remains unchecked in Jamshedpur

Sale of adulterated sweets remains unchecked in Jamshedpur

Jamshedpur, Oct. 26: Beware of the coloured sweets sold in open market in the city. They may contain harmful chemicals that will affect one’s health. The sale of adulterated sweets from shops across city remain uncheck and might affect the buyers.

With only a few days left for the festival of lights which sees huge sale of sweets from more than 150 shops in city there have been hardly any raids so far by the district health department.

Sources in the health department revealed that sweet-makers, in order to make mint profits, often use non-permitted colours, starch instead of sugar and aluminium-mixed varakh which can lead to severe digestive disorders.

Under the Food Safety and Standards Act 2006 (revised in 2012), sale of adulterated products that are detrimental to health can invite a hefty fine of anything between Rs 25,000 and Rs 2 lakh.

The administration is yet to begin sampling from shops. And even if the sampling is done in the next few days, the reports at the best will arrive days after Diwali.The lone state food testing lab at Namkum (Ranchi) takes 14 day time for the reports.

“We had formed a team and carried out collection of samples on October 11 and 12 from sweets shops prior to Durga puja. But are yet to get the report from the health department. I will soon direct the same team to carry out inspection of sweet shops,” said Dhalbhum SDO Chandan Kumar.

Incidentally, the teams had collected samples of butter, laddu, kajupista roll, barfi, paneer, khoa and dahi from shops located in Sakchi and Mango between October 11 and 12.

Use of harmful synthetic colours, including dyes is not permitted. But small manufacturers use the banned items just to give more colour to the sweets so as to make it attractive, officials said.

Most of the sweets manufactured in the district were from the unorganised sector — houses or group of people joining together to make a fast buck. Actions against the sweet manufacturer, after lab report would be initiated as per Food Safety and Standards Act 2006 (revised in 2012).