KASARAGOD: In an early morning drive in Kasaragod fish market, the Food Safety Department seized 200kg of rotten sardine from a truck that arrived from Kanyakumari district, said Food Safety Assistant Commissioner John Vijayakumar.
A squad comprising the Food Safety Assistant Commissioner, Extension Officer of the Fisheries Department and the Health Officer of Kasaragod municipality began checking refrigerated trucks arriving in the market at 3.30 am on Saturday.
The squad checked seven trucks, said Vijayakumar.
"In one truck we found rotten fish in a box and checked all the 50 boxes," the officer said.
The Fisheries Extension Officer found that eight boxes of sardine, each weighing 25kg, were not fit for human consumption.
"We handed over the boxes to the municipality officials to properly dispose of them," Vijayakumar said.
The fish agents and sellers tried to stop the officials and there was tension in the air, he said. So the police had to be called in, he said.
The Food Safety Department had been conducting raids across the district after a schoolgirl died and 52 others fell ill after eating shawarma from an eatery in Cheruvathur on May 1. The department served closure notices to 110 food businesses across the state during the raids that began on May 2.
On Friday, the department shut a small vegetable shop in Vidyanagar in Kasaragod because it was not registered with the department. It also closed a chicken shop next door for not having a food safety licence.
A store with annual revenue of less than Rs 12 lakh should be registered with the department and others should get a food safety licence from the department, he said.