FDA busts food adulteration: Jaggery dyed, paneer faked

Panaji: Food seized at Goa’s borders and tested at the FDA lab showed disturbing results. Sugarcane jaggery was found with added colours and adulterated with 17.48 mg/kg of Sunset Yellow and 62.67 mg/kg of Tartrazine.“We found colour added to jaggery in large quantities. No colour in any quantity is permitted to be added to jaggery,” director of food and drugs administration (FDA), Shweta Dessai, told TOI.The 600-kg consignment seized at the Mollem border from Belgaum on Aug 14–15 was destroyed. The vehicle carrying jaggery was detained after there was no label declaration on the food.In another case, the FDA seized a milk tanker at the Mollem border earlier this month.

The FDA found that milk was meant for a unit at Kundai, Ponda, that was engaged in producing analogue paneer.“When our food safety officers went to the unit at Kundaim at night, they found large quantities of vegetable oil packets used to make paneer being burnt to destroy evidence. The unit was supplying paneer analogue as paneer to several major restaurants and starred hotels,” Dessai said.The unit was bringing in low-fat skimmed milk and adding vegetable oil and citric acid, labelling it as dairy paneer to cut costs and mislead consumers.

Otherwise, high-fat milk would be required to make paneer, which is costly. When the paneer was sent for analysis, the FDA found that it was adulterated with the presence of added vegetable oil, she said.“We detected 1.576 mg/kg of Sitosterol, which is not permitted. The public was being misled into thinking they were eating protein-rich dairy paneer,” she said.The FDA is filing a case before the adjudicating officer in South against the unit for selling substandard and misbranded food. “The owner only had a registration certificate, but to manufacture paneer on such a large scale, he should have applied for a proper license,” she said, adding that the FDA learnt that the unit was set up a few months ago by a Pondicherry native with a pharmacy degree and a foreign post-graduation.“We were surprised to find an educated person acting in this manner,” she said. The unit has been shut down for the time being.