Shimla MC official's raid fruit traders shops.

Shimla, Oct 23 (UNI)With reports of alleged use of dangerous toxic chemicals by few fruit traders in the state capital to ripen fruits 'quickly', a team of Shimla Municipal Corporation (SMC) raided a trader's shop here today.

Sources said that the team of MC officials raided the fruit traders shop on Tuesday after receiving information regarding alleged use of toxic chemicals to ripen the fruits by the trader.

The team led by MC food inspector Virendra Chauhan also raided three eating joints in the Mall and the Lower Bazar area of the town on apprehensions that these shops were selling adulterated food prepared in unhygienic conditions. In a bid to check sale of adulterated foods and beverages in the capital during the ongoing festive season, the Shimla Municipal Corporation has launched a special drive across the town and suburbs.

The team collected a sample of banana from the shop of fruit trader. While two samples of prepared 'Channa' from two different 'Dhabbas' and a sample of 'Paneer' was collected from a restaurant for lab tests. ''These samples would be sent to the lab at Kandaghat for testing and if samples resulted positive, necessary action would be taken against the offenders,'' said Chauhan.

The special drive of SMC intends to cover all parts of the town to ensure that the quality of food products was maintained and public was not exposed to any health hazard. In this chain of its drive, the SMC had raided over dozen shops in the past few days in the suburb areas of the town including Dhalli and Sanjauli besides the main town. Expressing concern over the use of toxic chemicals in fruits, Rajesh Sharma, a local resident said, ''incidents of using toxic chemicals to ripe the fruits had come into limelight earlier also, this menace needs to be curbed at any cost as it is injurious to the health of the people.

Authorities concerned should look into this matter seriously and take stringent action against these fruit trader's who are playing with lives of people for making money.'' UNI