JAIPUR : A lab report said a popular sweet was unsafe. For about six weeks, officials say, nothing happened.
The Health Department has placed Dr. Manish Mittal, Jaipur’s Chief Medical and Health Officer (Second), under Awaiting Posting Orders (APO). The government alleges he suppressed an unsafe kaju katli sample report from Kesar Sweets, sitting on it for roughly a month and a half without acting against the establishment. He has been removed from the CMHO post and must now mark his attendance at the Directorate of Health.
The trail began on August 24. A CMHO team raided Kesar’s outlets in Durgapura and on SL Marg and collected samples of several sweets, including kaju katli, for testing. What followed, according to the account, was delay.
The shop’s licence was suspended on October 26, only after the matter appeared in the media. Even then, sweets kept selling. A fresh complaint reached the Health Minister’s office, and the Food Safety Department directed the CMHO to act. Dr. Mittal then sent a team to lock and seal the shop.
The sequence troubled the government. It judged Dr. Mittal’s role in the entire matter suspect, and acted against him.
The case lands at the worst moment: Diwali week, when Jaipur’s households buy sweets by the kilo and trust that someone has checked.
Dr. Mittal has not been found guilty of anything. The allegation of suppression is the government’s, and no response from him or from Kesar Sweets was available at publication.
But the order carries a message: a food-safety report is not a file to be parked. In Jaipur this week, someone paid for parking it.
“UNSAFE” REPORT, SIX WEEKS OF SILENCE: JAIPUR HEALTH CHIEF BENCHED OVER KESAR SWEETS FILE
