This Diwali don’t let adulteration spoil your festivities as chances are high that the sweets you pack home may be manufactured from contaminated ingredients. An inspection drive launched by the Thane unit of the Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) department during the ongoing festive season has led to the seizure of products like sweets, ghee and mawa of probably substandard quality.
While more than 30 samples of ingredients have been collected from sweet shops and other food manufacturing units across the twin-city for analysis, an inspection team from the FDA led by Food Safety Officer (FSO) U.S.Bade and Arvind Khadke under the supervision of Assistant Commissioner D.W.Bogawde and Joint Commissioner S.S.Deshmukh, conducted raids at two establishments in Bhayandar and Kashimira and seized adulterated mawa and ghee worth more than Rs 2.76 lakh on Thursday.
“While regular inspections are carried out this special festival drive started from August and will continue till December. The food ingredients were not stored in hygienic conditions. Samples were collected and sent to the laboratory for further testing in order to check its quality. The food business operators should be aware of their responsibilities to make and supply standard food to consumers,” said Bhogwade who also shared a toll free helpline number 1800 222 365 on which citizens can directly register complaints about any type of adulteration.
Those establishments whose food sample fails the chemical analysis will be brought to the book. A major ingredient in all sweet products, mawa is adulterated with starch and adding edible oils to get the required fat content, especially during the festive season like Diwali, when the demand for these products increases because of which, to make brisk business, adulteration becomes rampant.