Raids conducted on ghee making units

Vijayawada: More than 30 ghee manufacturing units are found to be adulterating ghee by substituting with vanaspathi and palmolein oil. In a special drive to curb ghee adulteration in Vijayawada, 20 teams led by food inspectors of nine districts, including 50 officers, raided the manufacturing units in and around the city.

Aghast over the development, State Joint Food Controller who led the raids said, “With the outcome of serious adulteration issues in food products in the district, we have conducted a drive to crack down on such faulty practices. Earlier, when the department has sent samples for assessment, a few cases were also booked against the traders”.

District Gazetted Food inspector M Srinivas Rao said that units, including Radha Madhav Foods, Gem Foods, Madhav Ghee, Madhura Honey and others, were found making food products without any licences. A unit at Surampalli was found manufacturing honey, mouth fresheners under ghee making licence.

“At ghee manufacturing centres, we found that large quantities of vanaspathi and palm oil are being packaged as pure ghee”, he observed.