Officials seize 260 kg of artificially coloured veggies

The raid was conducted by five food safety officers at 2 am and ended till 12 pm. They inspected over 75 shops both fruit and vegetable. “We seized 250 kg of green peas with artificial synthetic color from four roadside vendors and 10 kg beans with synthetic colour from a shop in the market. Two tonnes of bananas on which Ethephon was used to ripen it were seized from two shops. The samples of the seized fruits and vegetables have been sent to Food Analytical Lab,” said Dr A Ramakrishnan, designated officer of FSSAI.

The shops have been issued notices under Section 55 of Food Safety Service Act. Last week the Food Safety Department seized 10 tonnes of artificially ripened bananas worth Rs 10 lakh from the Koyambedu market. The official said that usually, it takes four to five days for the banana to ripen naturally, but when the chemical is sprayed, it ripens within 24 hours. “Though Koyambedu vendors were made part of several awareness yet they keep violating the rules,” said Ramakrishnan.