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January 31 is last date for registration for food manufacturers in Patiala
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Monday, 23 January, 2012, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Akshay Kalbag, Mumbai
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The health and family welfare department, Government of Punjab, has made it mandatory for those in the business of manufacturing and selling food products for human consumption to register by January 31, 2012.
During a brief telephonic conversation with FnB News, Dr Virinder Singh Mohi, Patiala’s civil surgeon, said, “The health department is committed to providing hygienic food to the residents of the city.”
He said, “The state government implemented the Food Safety and Standards Act in August 2011 according to the guidelines issued by the Central government. Under this Act, all establishments dealing with food have to complete their registration and acquire the requisite licenses.”
Dr Mohi added, “It is mandatory for every restaurant, bakery, sweet shop, motel, dhaba or confectionery store, whose annual sales exceed Rs 12 lakh, dairy and milk unit whose milk production is between 500 and 50,000 litres a day, processing unit for refined oils whose capacity exceeds two metric tonnes per day, three-star hotel or restaurant whose business is more than Rs 12 lakh per year and slaughter house with 2-10 large animals, 10-150 small animals, 50-1,000 poultry birds and meat processing units whose capacity is 500 kilograms per day to apply for the license and register at the civil surgeon's office in Patiala.”
“The annual licensing fee ranges between Rs 2,000 and Rs 3,000, depending upon the size and volume of output of a unit,” he said. He added that the volume of sales a unit registered would be gauged from the annual sales tax or value-added tax (VAT) returns.
Dr Mohi categorically stated that vendors, retailers, hawkers and even those who were itinerant would not be exempt from the rule. “They will have to pay an annual registration fee of just Rs 100 per annum.”
“If any food business operator fails to comply with the rule, he is obviously liable to be punished. We will not be too harsh on the smaller vendors, but if a big player bends the rule, we will have no choice but to initiate action, by way of either a monetary fine or imprisonment, against him,” he further said.
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