Provincial Minister for Agriculture Dr. Farrukh Javed has directed all district coordination officers, senior officers of Agriculture Department, pesticide and fertilizer inspectors to accelerate crackdown for ensuring complete eradication of adulteration in pesticides and fertilizers and bringing the ratio of adulteration to zero. He directed that strict action should be taken as per law against the persons involved in heinous crime of adulteration in agri medicines. He said that adulteration in pesticides will be completely eliminated in accordance with the vision of Chief Minister Punjab.
He expressed these views while presiding over a review meeting of crackdown continuing against spurious agri medicines throughout the province. During a briefing it was told that teams of Agriculture Department Extension and Plant Protection Punjab are active to ensure provision of quality pesticides and fertilizer to the farmers. He said that strict action is being taken against the mafia involved in the business of spurious and substandard agri medicines and fertilizers and spurious and substandard medicines and fertilizers worth more than one crore rupees have been recovered so far from various districts. He said that teams of Agriculture Department accompanied by administration and local police recovered spurious pesticides on a large scale by conducting raid in Sialkot, Faisalabad and Gujranwala and the persons involved in this heinous crime have been handed over to police. He said that after successful raid in Sialkot, 620 bottles of spurious liquid fertilizer worth Rs. 80 lakh of Paragon Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. Multan were taken into possession and an FIR was got registered against regional manager of the company Syed Tanvir Shah. After successful raid in Faisalabad, a factory involved in manufacturing of spurious SSP, DAP and other fertilizers was caught and five persons were got arrested on the spot besides material used in spurious fertilizers were confiscated. The teams of Agriculture Department took samples of spurious fertilizers into possession from Sialkot and Faisalabad and sent to fertilizer laboratory for chemical analysis. The Minister appreciated the performance of officers of Agriculture Department and directed to continue action against adulteration mafia efficiently.