Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
A statewide food safety crackdown has exposed serious hygiene and quality violations at hotels, restaurants, resorts and public food facilities across Karnataka, with authorities seizing large quantities of expired and unsafe food items and issuing multiple notices to establishments found flouting regulations.
As part of the intensified inspection drive, food safety officials conducted checks in Mysuru city and district on Saturday. At the Rio Meridian Hotel, authorities seized 9 kg of chicken after finding it beyond its expiry date. Inspections at four other hotels led to the seizure of 68 kg of meat from the Grand Mercure Hotel, while 4 kg of mushrooms were confiscated from Q Star Hotel.
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Separate inspection drives in Mysuru and Nanjangud taluks covered three resorts, resulting in three notices being issued. Officials collected five food samples for laboratory analysis, including two legal samples and three survey samples. Around 16 kg of expired and perishable food items were discarded during the operation.
The latest action is part of a wider campaign by the Karnataka Food Safety and Drug Administration Department to ensure compliance with food safety norms across the state.
In coastal Karnataka, officials carried out a surprise inspection at a KFC outlet in Mangaluru’s City Centre on K.S. Rao Road following a consumer complaint. The customer alleged that a Chicken Peri Peri Leg purchased online tasted stale and was unfit for consumption. Food safety teams inspected the outlet’s kitchen, storage areas, cold rooms, freezers and cooked food stocks as part of the investigation.
The ongoing crackdown has extended to major urban centres including Bengaluru, Mysuru and Mangaluru, where inspections of three-star and five-star hotels uncovered expired food products, rotten vegetables, fungal contamination and improper meat storage practices.
According to officials, more than 1,000 kg of unsafe food items have been seized during recent operations across the state.
The inspections have not been limited to private establishments. Food outlets operating within key government complexes in Bengaluru, including Vidhana Soudha, Vikasa Soudha and Arogya Soudha, were also found violating food safety norms. Authorities reported unhygienic food handling practices, inadequate pest-control measures and the presence of expired ingredients in some facilities.
Quick-commerce storage centres and community feeding facilities, including certain Indira Canteens, have also come under scrutiny, with some receiving notices and facing closure orders over sanitation deficiencies.
Officials said the enforcement drive is aimed at ensuring strict adherence to the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, and related licensing regulations. Food business operators have been directed to maintain proper temperature control, sanitation standards and waste disposal systems.
In Bengaluru Urban district alone, food safety teams recently inspected 60 three-star and five-star hotels and collected 77 food samples for laboratory testing, signalling that the state’s intensified monitoring campaign is set to continue.
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SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
