Under the directions of Punjab government, the operation against adulteration in edibles should be made result-oriented in the district and the persons involved in this heinous crime of adulteration should be taken to task. These directions were issued to the officers of concerned departments during a meeting of District Task Force held here on the instruction of DCO Saeed Wahlah.
The meeting was presided over by District Officer Coord Liaqat Ali Chatha and he directed special price magistrates to continue their campaign against price hike and sale of substandard items of daily use, and raids should be conducted in the market and bazaars consistently.
He said that the date of manufacturing, expiry date, weight, ingredients and the company's name of manufacturer should also be checked on the edibles being sold in packets and action should be taken against the violators. He directed to curb the business of sale of substandard drinking water by some miscreants and fraudulent.
He stressed on discouraging the use of empty drums of chemicals for carrying milk, water and other edibles. During the meeting EDO Health Dr Muhammad Siddique said that 11,582 samples of edibles had been taken from different factories, hotels and shops during last year by the food inspectors of health department, out of which 4611 were declared unfit by the Food Testing Laboratory and cases had been referred to the concerned court for trial against the accused.
DO Livestock Dr Abdul Rehman said that the verterniry officers conducted 2700 raids on the butchers' shops during last 10 days' campaign and 192 FIRs had been got registered against the butchers involved in sale of substandard and unhygienic meat.
Further, 52 butchers were got arrested on the charge of slaughtering animals out of official slaughterhouse. Among others the meeting was also attended by EDO Agri Farman Ali, DOR Mubashar Hussain, SAO Saeed Dilloh, DO Labour Sakhawat Ali, DO Enterprises Shahbaz Khan, DFC Abdul Gafoor, President of Anjuman Arthian Galla Mandi Asif Aslam, rep of Retailers Hashim and rep of consumers Ms Kaneez Ishauqe.