Crop Care Federation sends legal notice to Kerala Food Safety Commissioner

Crop Care Federation of India (CCFI), an association of crop protection product manufacturers, has sent a legal notice to Food Safety Commissioner of Kerala asking its department head, T V Anupama, to withdraw unfounded and unsubstantiated allegations levelled by her against Tamil Nadu farmers. Kerala government and its Food Safety Department had earlier accused Tamil Nadu farmers of supplying vegetables with excessive pesticides above the permissible levels.
 
CCFI also took stern notice of a recent statement made by Food Safety Commissioner of Kerala in an editorial story published under the headline “Kerala’s pesticide paranoia and organic farming campaign: Does the state have any real data?” in popular news portal ‘The News Minute’. As per the story Anupama said that according to her ‘observation’, vegetables sourced from Tamil Nadu were found with pesticides 5-10 times higher than the permissible levels.
 
After a detailed investigation CCFI is of the opinion that this claim is not just false, but also unsupported by any scientific proof. In fact, CCFI said that Anupama’s claims are contradictory to the observations of Dr Thomas Biju Mathew of Kerala Agricultural University who was head of the team that analysed vegetable samples allegedly from Tamil Nadu.
 
“Kerala government should investigate such malpractices and misuse of power by its officers. We urge the state government to take strict action against such irresponsible statement by its officers which have led to massive scare mongering among consumers in Kerala and financial loss for farmers in Tamil Nadu. We request the government to remove the Food Commissioner of Kerala, if found guilty, for her irresponsible act,” said Rajju Shroff, president, CCFI.
 
“CCFI has given the Food Safety Commission of Kerala an ultimatum of 15 days to withdraw its unfounded allegations after which the association will proceed with a criminal suit against the government and the food safety department under sections 500 (Punishment For Defamation), 504 (Intentional Insult with intent to provoke breach of the Peace), and 505 (Statements Conducing to Public Mischief) of the Indian Penal Code,” said CCFI in a press release.
 
Taking a strong objection to administrative overreach of Kerala Food Commissioner, S Ganesan, pubic & policy advisor to CCFI said Kerala government violated Food and Safety Standards Act 2006 by sending its team of officials to Tamil Nadu to visit farmers field for so called inspection; an act which was not permitted by the Food Safety Act thus making it arbitrary unlawful and questionable.
 
Ganesan added, “We regret to have to observe abuse of powers by Kerala Food Safety Authority with malafide motives. Their attempts to usurp timid farmers of Tamil Nadu is condemnable. This episode has unnecessarily tainted the image of vegetables supplied from Tamil Nadu to Kerala and has certainly impacted the Tamil Nadu farmers negatively.” CCFI also expressed doubts on the food safety officials’ claims of collecting 700 vegetable samples and has sought factual information about this.