Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): After Food and Drug Administration Department (FDA) in Maharashtra raided food outlets there, an anti-adulteration drive has been intensified in Madhya Pradesh.
The FDA and Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC) mobile court conducted raids, issued challan, imposed fines against high-end restaurants and hotels in last couple of days.
Those covered under the check drive included major high-end restaurants like Bansal One, DB Mall and those on Narmadapuram Road. Nearly 90 challans have been issued in just two days.
Led by special municipal magistrate (first class) Tarunendra Pratap Singh, the operation resulted in the registration of 90 cases involving violation of food safety regulations. A sum of Rs 5.80 lakh in fines was recovered during the drive.
However, Madhya Pradesh has showed a decline in adulteration percentage of food items in last four years.
The national level adulteration percentage is 16% while Madhya Pradesh adulteration percentage was 11% last year, according to MP Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) officials.
In terms of percentage of sample failure (adulteration), UP tops followed by Rajasthan and Maharashtra. Madhya Pradesh ranks fifth in adulteration after Rajasthan, Maharashtra.
Though FDA in Madhya Pradesh collects samples round the year for regular monitoring, testing bottlenecks exist due to limited state food and drug laboratories in major hubs like Bhopal, Indore and Jabalpur.
FDA state senior officer DK Verma said, Continuously, the adulteration percentage of food and milk products samples has declined.
Last year, it was 11 per cent while national level food adulteration percentage is 16%. Four-year data shows that food adulteration continues to decline in MP in comparison to national data.
Milk & other products sample failure percentage in MP
Year Samples Unsafe Failure Percentage
2021-22 16,059 109 2900 18%
2022-23 12,517 80 2092 16.73%
2023-24 13,998 108 2022 14.4%
2024-25 13920 125 1635 11.7%
