2 sued for milk adulteration in Sirajganj

Sirajganj District Health Department yesterday lodged two separate cases with Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Court against two officials of a milk collection centre and a 'chhana' (curdled milk) production centre on charge of their involvement with milk adulteration.
The accused officials are Moazzel Hossain, manager of Abdul Monayem Limited at Baghabarighat and Bachhu Sheikh, manager of a 'chhana' production centre at Charachithulia village in Shahzadpur upazila, reported our correspondent in Sirajganj.
The health department officials said they filed the cases against the two officials as Public Health Institution in Dhaka in its tests found adulterated milk from the two centres at Shahzadpur last week.
The actions of the health department was taken following media reports in late October which say some dishonest businessmen extracted fat from cow milk and mixed chemicals and added extra water to milk in Sirajganj and Pabna.
Meanwhile, though adulteration has been found in milk and actions also taken against the dishonest traders, melamine tests of the five suspected liquid milk samples became uncertain either for fund crisis or for ignorance of the officials concerned.
The district health department sent five samples of milk and 'chhana' (curdled milk) to Bangladesh Standards and Testing Institution (BSTI) for chemical and melamine tests on November 2.
But BSTI refused to test those samples, as the health department could not pay fees for the tests, district Civil Surgeon Towhiqul Islam told The Daily Star.
Earlier on November 12, The Daily Star ran a report titled: "Chemicals in milk not tested for lack of fund: BSIT returns samples to Sirajganj health department after it failed to pay fees."
In a clarification of the report, BSTI said the actual reason why it did not accept the samples was that they needed at least one litre of milk in each sample for melamine and other chemical tests, but each of the five samples, sent by Sirajganj health department, contained only 100 ml of milk.
BSTI Director General Azmal Hossain said they also informed the district health department officials that the tests of each sample would require Tk 6,332.
He said BSTI conducts tests of any samples sent by the government or semi-government agencies in a shortest possible time and that they have to pay fees after completion of the tests.
Whatever the claims by the health department or the BSTI are, what happened by this time is that melamine and chemical tests of the samples of suspected milk, collected from milk collection centers in Shahzadpur, could not be conducted.
"We cannot find similar milk or curdled milk from the centers from where we earlier collected milk samples," said Shahzadpur Upazila Sanitary Inspector Dr Ansar Ali.
"Now traders are aware of. We are not going to get samples of milk which we suspected to be contaminated with chemicals," he told The Daily Star over phone.
Asked if they are aware of that each sample requires one liter of milk for its melamine and chemical tests, Ansar Ali said they did not send samples to BSTI for tests earlier.
"We usually send samples of 200 ml containers to Public Health Institution," he said.
Meanwhile, many dishonest traders who were involved with milk adulteration went absconding following the drives launched against them by local law enforcement agencies, sources said.
Civil Surgeon Towhiqul Islam of Sirajganj said a monitoring team has been working in the area to find out the unscrupulous traders and added that if they got any evidence of adulteration, they would take necessary action with the help of local administration.
The district health department also sent nine new samples of milk from different milk production and collection centers in Shahzadpur upazila and sent those to the Public Health Institution in the capital for test, an official said.