Spurious jaggery unit raided in Bhimavaram

Bhimavaram: The Vigilance and Food Safety officials raided a spurious jaggery manufacturing unit and recovered huge amounts of hazardous raw material at Uttarapalem of Veeravasaram mandal in West Godavari district on Tuesday. 

The cost of fake jaggery was estimated at Rs 5.22 lakh.

According to vigilance officials, the raid was conducted following directives from Vigilance SP B Achutarao. 

During raids, the officials came to know that the manufacturers were making use of inferior quality jaggery from Anakapalli and substandard sugar available in market to prepare jaggery. 

A 10 kg of sodium hydrosulphite chemical used for making jaggery was also recovered.

Apart from 640 kgs of jaggery ready for sale and 7,000 kgs of low quality jaggery and 9,000 kgs of substandard sugar was  also found during the raid.

The officials have been sending the samples of raw material being used by the manufacturer to Hyderabad for examination.  

Based on lab reports, they would register a case, they added.