Substandard food served in eateries at Secretariat: customers

Over 5,000 govt. staff and hundreds of outsiders visit them

With inadequate inspections and lack of monitoring, eateries in the Secretariat in the city are serving substandard food to over 5,000 government employees working on the campus and hundreds of visitors.

Staff from various departments, who frequent the eateries, allege that food items served are substandard. In the absence of competitors, they are forced to eat at the eateries. “Many a times, we realised food from the previous day is served the next day. Just because there are no major players on the campus, these eateries are taking us for a ride,” an official said.

The only relief is the cooperative canteen. “At least in the cooperative canteen, our feedback is taken seriously and they rectify if we make a complaint. The private eateries are not under anyone’s control. You can see people urinating near one of the eateries,” said a Section Officer from a department.

Banned 20 years ago

After a G.O. that banned private eateries on the campus 20 years ago, the eateries took refuge in the buildings under the control of the Army on the campus. “One of them got a stay from the court. Presently, a few of them are in State government buildings and others operating from Army buildings. Unless there are regular inspections by the Greater Chennai Corporation’s Health Department and FSSAI, these eateries cannot be controlled,” pointed out an employee.

Only if well-known hotels are allowed to function on the campus, the eateries will be forced to supply quality food, a cross-section of the government staff said. At least about 2,000 people visit the Secretariat during the Assembly session and about 1,000 people visit the campus on other days.

Deputy Commissioner (Health) of the Greater Chennai Corporation P. Madhusudhan Reddy said the inspection for quality of food was by the Food Safety Department. “However, hygiene and public health are our subjects and we will send a team to check the claims. If the complaints are found true, we will take action,” he said.

The Public Department officer in-charge of the Secretariat campus A.R. Rahul Nadh was not available for comment.

FSSAI destroys artificially coloured eggs

Food Safety officials destroying artificially coloured leghorn eggs in the city on Sunday. 

3,900 leghorn eggs destroyed

Officials of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) in Coimbatore on Sunday destroyed 3,900 leghorn eggs that were artificially coloured to look like eggs of country chicken, which are superior in terms of quality.

They found that the sellers were using colourants, including decoction of tea, to give the brownish tint to the egg shell.

K. Tamilselvan, Designated Officer of the FSSAI in Coimbatore, said that simultaneous checks were conducted at various markets namely the whole sale fish market and retail fish market at Ukkadam, Uzhavar Santhais at Vadavalli, Singanallur and R.S. Puram, and MGR Market Anna Market on Mettupalayam Road.

“The checks were conducted based on a complaint which said that vendors were selling white leghorn eggs as country chicken eggs after colouring them. Food Safety officers found that egg sold by at least 10 vendors were coloured white leghorn eggs. A total of 3,900 coloured eggs were seized and destroyed,” he said.

According to Dr. Tamilselvan, most of these vendors were procuring white leghorn eggs of small size from poultries in Namakkal and Salem and later colouring them to give the effect of country chicken eggs.

“While one leghorn egg is sold for ₹5 to ₹5.50, the vendors were selling coloured eggs for ₹7 and above.

They were selling such coloured eggs as eggs of free-range country chicken which is superior to eggs laid by chicken grown in farm,” he said.

Food Safety officials did spot checks to find the adulteration by soaking suspected eggs in water and the colour was found dissolving in the water. Apart from destroying the 3,900 coloured eggs, officials warned the vendors not to sell adulterated eggs in the future.

Joint action to curb smuggling and sale of banned tobacco products

Banned tobacco products seized during a joint raid by the police and food safety officials. 

‘Spot fine will bring down the sale of gutkha in Coimbatore’

The crackdown by the police and Food Safety Department on the sale of banned tobacco products is yet to cut the inflow of the contraband from other States to Coimbatore.

On Friday, the police seized 214.5 kg of banned tobacco products from a resident of P.N. Pudur on Maruthamalai Road. The seized products included multiple brands of gutka, manufacture and sale of which are banned in many States, including Tamil Nadu.

The police and Food Safety officials cite manpower constraints as a hurdle for full-fledged and dedicated action against the smuggling and sale of banned tobacco products. On an average, five to 10 cases are registered by the Coimbatore city and rural police a day under provisions of the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Act (COTPA), 2003. The numbers go up on days when special drives are conducted, say officials.

Coimbatore city police alone registered close 1,400 cases under the COTPA in 2019, majority of which were registered against those running petty shops. Sources with the Coimbatore rural police said that around 1,500 cases were registered in the rural limits for the offence in the same period.

In Coimbatore city, Police Commissioner Sumit Sharan has tasked Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) L. Balaji Saravanan to enforce the ban by deploying police personnel attached to the 15 law and order police stations. A senior police officer attached to the city police said that the main challenge in enforcing the ban was manpower constraints. The official admitted that police were also not able to take investigation to the next level to trace the supply chain of the contraband due to the same reason.

Officials with the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) said they were hopeful of bringing down the sale of banned tobacco products as the Food Safety Department recently empowered Designated Officers in each district to issue spot fine to those found stocking or selling the items.

K. Tamilselvan, Designated Officer of the FSSAI in Coimbatore, said that it booked 50 persons, most of them running petty shops and grocery stores, for stocking and selling prohibited tobacco products.

“We expect that the spot fining will bring down the sale of gutkha in Coimbatore as the fine amount slapped on the offender is high. Fine amount to the tune of ₹2.5 lakh was collected from the offenders during special checks conducted to enforce spot fining in the last one month,” he said.

While first time offender is slapped with a fine of ₹5,000, the fine amount doubles to ₹10,000 when a person is caught selling the products for a second time. A fine of ₹25,000 and cancellation of FSSAI’s registration certificate are the penalty for third-time offender.

District Collector K. Rajamani said that a meeting of officials from the police, FSSAI, Revenue Department and the local bodies will be held soon to discuss modalities to enforce the ban.

Food safety workshop held at CMC

K.S. Devaraj, Food Safety Officer, Ranipet, inspecting food samples at CMC, Vellore on Saturday. 

Objective is to create awareness about nutritious food

A workshop on Food Safety—our responsibility to learn and share was organised at Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore-Bagayam campus on Saturday. Food Safety Officer, Ranipet, K.S. Devaraj who inaugurated the workshop for Post Graduate and final year students of Department of Dietetics, CMC, Vellore, gave a detailed account of identification of food samples and asked the participants to be cautious on food adulteration.

Food safety lectures by experts were part of the programme, where the eminent speakers shared their knowledge at the discussions held later in the day and panellists discussed issues regarding food safety in current scenario at hospitals as well as at home.

The objective of the workshop was to create awareness and disseminate food safety measures to be followed in a hospital dietary kitchen to deliver safe nutritious food for patients, said B. Manimegalai, senior lecturer from the Department of Dietetics, CMC.

Food street certified by FSSAI at Hitec City

GHMC distributes ID cards to vendors to check authenticity.

Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, a corporation official said even municipal administration and urban development minister K.T. Rama Rao has been impressed by a demonstration arranged by GHMC on hygienic street food.

Hyderabad: After Ahmedabad and Mumbai, Hyderabad will have a food street certified by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) opposite Shilparamam near Hi-Tec City.

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has recently completed a certification programme for street vendors on use of specific cooking oils, preparing vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes at particular temperatures, and keeping the food items covered.

Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, a corporation official said even municipal administration and urban development minister K.T. Rama Rao has been impressed by a demonstration arranged by GHMC on hygienic street food. The minister wanted that food streets be located in all the zones of the corporation for the benefit of people.

Serilingampally zone is slated to have the city’s first green vending street food zone. The food street at Shilparamam will be located near the underpass since it would not interrupt the traffic in the area and be pedestrian friendly.

The initiative for having food streets had been taken following a study conducted by third party agency Ernst & Young (EY) LLP.

When asked about the failure of implementing the street food vending policy in Hyderabad so far, the corporation official claimed that HMRL and traffic police have played spoilsport in this regard. While HMRL disturbed the location of vending zones, traffic police did not agree with remaining locations citing traffic issues.

The GHMC official said the corporation has distributed identity cards to street food vendors so that people could check their authenticity.