The Dhanbad Municipal Corporation on Friday launched a hygiene inspection drive against the roadside dhabas situated on the station road, a day after reopening of restaurants following the relaxations allowed by the state government.

The hour-long inspection carried out under the leadership of Anil Kumar, DMC food inspector, during the morning from 10.45 am to 11.45 am also led to the detection of unhygienic practices by five road Dhabas including the preservation of stale food and wrong practice of keeping food in the open.

Kumar gave stern warning to the faulty dhaba operators asking them to mend their ways immediately or face action as per the Jharkhand Municipality act ranging from imposition of fines to sealing of shops.

Taking note of lack of proper garbage disposal, Kumar also instructed them to ensure proper garbage disposal using the door to door garbage collection service of DMC and make payment of user charges to DMC.

Talking to The Telegraph Online on Friday, Anil Kumar said, “the drive launched today will continue in other areas also as we have covered the dhabas operating on the road stretch from Rangatand Chowk to Hanuman Temple while the other food outlets operating from other side of Hanuman Temple to Railway auditorium will also be taken to task soon.”

“As the restaurants reopened only since yesterday, so we have not imposed any fine for the violation and hygiene and rather carried out drive of today as an awareness exercise during which we clearly told them that such can’t be served to customers, as it will adversely affect their health”said

“We have also destroyed some of stale food caught lying in the freezer of five out of 13 inspected dhabas and apprised the dhaba operators about the rule pertaining to the Jharkhand Municipality Act under which action may be initiated against them for flouting laid norms,” said Kumar.

“We also objected to the practice of Dhaba operators dumping huge amount of garbage including food leftovers on the road side due to non use of door to door garbage collection service and also warned them against the illegal dumping of garbage” said Kumar

“The shopkeepers were asked to keep the garbage in dustbins only which will be collected by personnel of Ramky Enviro Engineers executing solid waste management project” said Kumar and added that they were also asked to pay the user charges being collected by DMC before ensuring door to door garbage collection.