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Magistrates asked for report on adulteration cases

* Nazim says poor enforcement policy responsible for increase in adulteration

LAHORE: In response to a letter written by the district coordination officer seven days ago, the district and sessions judge has asked five special judicial magistrates to submit a report on progress on cases being tried under the Pure Food Ordinance 1960.

The DCO had requested the sessions judge to set up exclusive courts to try and punish adulterators besides starting summary trials of related offences.

Calling adulteration a crime more serious than murder, nazim Amer Mehmood said the system was responsible for the increasing phenomenon of adulteration of food and other everyday items. He told Daily Times on Tuesday that the city government had prepared a plan to improve coordination between the food department, police and courts to make sure that all adulterators were punished.

He said the city government’s food department was one of the most active departments in the city. However, despite efforts by officials to counter adulteration, no improvement had been made because of the city government’s poor enforcement policy, he added. “Unless municipal courts support municipal laws, no change can take place,” he said.

According to data collected by the city government, more than 70,000 adulteration cases have been sent to courts in the past 13 years, but not a single adulterator has ever been convicted. The DCO’s letter stated that in the absence of feed back from the staff of special judicial magistrates, piles of case properties had been lying with the food department, causing storage problems. The letter had requested that the food department staff should be allowed to see the records of disposed off cases so that case properties could also be disposed off.

The letter also requested that the special judicial magistrates should be empowered to undertake summary trials of offences, which were punishable under Clause (a) of Section 23 of the ordinance or Sub-Section (2) of the said section in accordance to the provision of Chapter XXII of that code.

The DCO requested that exclusive courts should be set up to deal with food cases. Presently, special judicial magistrates function on a multipurpose basis. They not only take cognizance of cases from the food department, but also from other city government departments. This situation had culminated in an increase in the number of cases. Calling for an effective punishment system, the letter states, “Observed that in some cases, the accused, though previous convict, is awarded lesser punishment as if he was not a previous convict. It is humbly requested that the learned special judicial magistrates may be advised to award adequate sentences u/s 23 of Pure Food Ordinance 1960.” District officer (food) Chaudhry Munir Ahmad said that in cases where the violator was arrested, he was freed after paying a fine, and continued adulterating food within hours of his release.

He said that even though there was mandatory punishment, the courts usually announced punishment to an adulterator till the end of proceedings, which basically meant no punishment. He said more than 50 percent of food samples collected were found adulterated. He said milk, milk products, oils and fats topped the list of adulterated items while juices, tea, food acids, spices and honey were also found adulterated. Chaudhry Munir said, “Adulteration and the use of toxic chemicals to process food is common in our country, contributing to an increase in the number of deadly diseases.” mansab dogar

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