JAIPUR: Recently conducted raids at city’s restaurants, food item godowns and food processing units have brought shocking results to the fore. People are not aware that most food they are consuming might be adulterated or impure.
From using unsafe synthetic food colours to compromising with food purity, health department’s food safety officers have found that all during their raids conducted in January and February. Even powdered spices are being sold in the market without packaging it. There are provisions under Food Safety Standard Act, which do not permit sale of spices without packaging. This year, food safety officers have taken their efforts to a new high to ensure availability of food safety but what they have found during their inspections could be just the tip of the iceberg.
“We have found that food handlers at restaurants were not having any kind of medical fitness certificates. The certificate is necessary because if someone has tuberculosis and he is preparing or serving food, he may infect others. Also, if a food handler is suffering from any skin infection, he may transmit it to his clients. Under Food Safety and Standard Act (FSSA), there is a provision of fitness certificate, but we found that the restaurants are violating the norm of FSSA,” said a health department official.
Besides, it has also been found during inspection that a restaurant selling Chinese food had kept vegetarian and non-vegetarian food at the same place, which is violation of FSSA. The health department had seized three such restaurants in past two months for violating FSSA norms. The three restaurants were re-opened only after renovation, as directed by the food safety wing.
Also, the food safety officers claimed that among the total pulses samples, there four samples of pulses they had taken have failed quality test. The pulses were containing synthetic food colour, which were unsafe. Besides, the health department is awaiting more test report of samples of food items during their raids.
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