Ahmedgarh dairies pass purity check

Our Correspondent

Mandi Ahmedgarh, September 2

No objectionable material was found at dairies of the town during a midnight surprise check by a joint team of three departments, supervised by Commissioner of Food and Drug Administration Kahan Singh Pannu.

The officials find no trace of spurious products during sample testing in a mobile laboratory. The team comprised officials from Dairy Development and Food Safety. The CIA staff sealed the samples collected from three major dairies of the area.

The action followed the seizure of a huge quantity of spurious cheese by the Khanna police at Bija on Friday. The owner of the cheese had claimed that he had brought the poor quality product from a dairy at Ahmedgarh.

Assistant Commissioner (Food) Ravinder Garg said a joint team comprising senior functionaries from Sangrur, Patiala, Ludhiana and Mansa districts conducted a surprise check at various dairies of the town on the night of Saturday. Quick spot tests in a mobile laboratory, including the neutraliser test, ruled out the presence of any objectionable material in any of the samples sealed from Khushi Dairy, Vijay Milk Centre and Billu Di Dairy where khoya and paneer were being prepared.

While the samples were sent to the state laboratory for testing purity and percentage of various nutrients, preliminary tests suggested chemicals injurious to human health were neither stocked at these places nor used in preparation of the dairy products.       

Patiala Deputy Director, Dairy Development, Ashok Rauni, who headed one of the teams, acknowledged that the Mission Tandarust Punjab had prompted genuine producers of milk products to follow the guidelines of the department in letter and in spirit.