Govt berated for substandard food at restaurants

The Sindh government came under fire from an opposition legislator in the Sindh Assembly on Wednesday for not taking action on the sale of substandard food in the province which caused the deaths of two minor brothers as they allegedly ate poisonous food from a famous restaurant in the Defence area.

Speaking on a call-attention notice, Grand Democratic Alliance MPA Nusrat Seher Abbasi criticised the performance of the Sindh Food Authority (SFA) which, according to her, had failed to check quality of food being served at restaurants. The food authority came into action only after lives of two minors were lost, the MPA said.

Abbasi asked the house to take notice of the dysfunctional and understaffed SFA. She lamented that laboratories in Sindh were in a shambles and they could not carry out food tests. “The situation is being so adverse that one has to taste a liquid to check whether it is honey or alcohol,” she said.

“Mothers in the province have been in sheer distraught over the deaths of two minors as they want to know where the Sindh government has gone?” she said.

Responding to the call-attention notice, Sindh Food Minister Hari Ram Kishori Lal said the SFA came into existence in the current year after the governing board of the authority was constituted in March.

He said five officers had so far been appointed in the provincial food authority, who included three directors and three deputy directors. The minister clarified that the SFA, since its inception, had raided 5,598 restaurants and other food selling and manufacturing points in the province and it also imposed fines to the tune of Rs 1.6 million on various food sellers.