Amritsar, February 4
The Supreme Court (SC) verdict directing the state governments to ensure quality of milk and to give up its "lenient" attitude towards those responsible for adulteration of milk and milk products with hazardous synthetic substances has come as a respite to the consumers in the city who often complain about adulterated and substandard milk supply.
The Supreme Court (SC) verdict directing the state governments to ensure quality of milk and to give up its "lenient" attitude towards those responsible for adulteration of milk and milk products with hazardous synthetic substances has come as a respite to the consumers in the city who often complain about adulterated and substandard milk supply.
A resident of Cheel Mandi, Parminder
Singh, said the reaction of the state government in keeping a tab on the
hygienic standards of eatables was far from satisfactory. This despite the fact
that the Union Government admitted before the SC that 70 per cent of the milk
in the country was found adulterated in one way or the other in 2012. The
situation is no different in the city.
The field is open for unscrupulous
sellers and dealers, as a majority of the city residents prefer to procure
"loose" milk. Milk Plan officials say that, on an average, there is
10 per cent annual increase in the consumption of pouched milk in Amritsar.
The only organised body selling
packaged and pasteurised milk here is Milk Plant, Verka, which is a unit of the
Markfed.
The milk plant periodically holds
quality tests on "loose" milk to convince customers to turn to
packaged milk. Sources in the plant said many a time, adulteration using water,
caustic soda, urea and castor oil was detected.
Adulteration using water, caustic oil
to increase the shelf life of the produce had been found. As per standard
specifications, solid, not fat, must be at least 8.5 in cow milk and over nine
in buffalo milk.
This despite the fact that the new Food
Safety and Standards Act, 2006 was introduced in the country. Besides, the
district does not have any food testing lab and each sample has to be
dispatched to the Chandigarh laboratory. It took around 20 days to get the
result of the food test.
It may be mentioned here that the
Prevention of Food Adulteration Act 1954 was replaced with the Food Standard
and Safety Act in August 2011. As per the new Act, the penalty on the
adulteration using water ranged from Rs 25,000 to Rs 2 lakh, while the presence
of injurious ingredients could land an offender in jail for life and penalty up
to Rs 10 lakh.
Dr Shiv Karan Kahlon, District Health Officer
(DHO), who is the designated officer for the implementation of the act, while
talking about the exact number of halwai shops in the city, said the data was
not yet available as the registration under the new Food Safety and Standards
Act, 2006, was undergoing.
OfficialSpeak
Dr Shiv Karan Kahlon, District Health Officer, said Amritsar is not the only city that does not have a laboratorty and each district in the state sends its samples to Chandigarh. He stressed that his department regularly confiscates milk, milk products and other eatables to ensure quality. The DHO said that confiscation of adulterated eatables was a continuous process and his department was regularly spotting spurious eatables.
Dr Shiv Karan Kahlon, District Health Officer, said Amritsar is not the only city that does not have a laboratorty and each district in the state sends its samples to Chandigarh. He stressed that his department regularly confiscates milk, milk products and other eatables to ensure quality. The DHO said that confiscation of adulterated eatables was a continuous process and his department was regularly spotting spurious eatables.
