PIONEER EDGE NEWS SERVICE/ Bharadisain
The State government is working on a regulation for the food items and fertilisers causing cancer and will take action against the offenders. Information in this regard was given by the Health minister Dhan Singh Rawat in Vidhan Sabha on Thursday. He added that the Food Safety and Drug Administration department will undertake a week-long campaign every month against food adulteration.
The minister said the Haat Bazaars operated in different parts of the State will also be brought under the ambit of the campaign. Responding to a question by the Doiwala MLA Brijbhushan Gairola, the minister said that the FDA collected a total of 3,311 food samples in the year 2023-24 and 2024 -2025 and found 330 samples unsafe/ adulterated.
He said that the department has registered cases in courts in all the above-mentioned cases. He said that nine posts of senior food safety officers are vacant in the department. Similarly, the department has sent requisition to the Uttarakhand Public Service Commission for recruitment on 28 posts of the food safety officers. The minister further informed that the Food Testing lab of the department will start functioning from March 31, 2026.
Dharampur MLA, Vinod Chamoli said that the government should hand over the Food Safety works to the civic bodies as earlier. He said that the local bodies were performing the enforcement works of food safety efficiently.
