CHANDIGARH - Health officials in Punjab Saturday seized huge quantities of spurious milk, khoya and ghee from various godowns, cold storages and sweet shops in a stepped-up campaign against adulterated products ahead of the Diwali festival season.

Raids were conducted at various places and samples were taken for testing by health officials in Ferozepur, Sangrur, Ludhiana, Mohali, Phagwara, Bathinda and several other places.

The officials said that while spurious and adulterated stocks were seized at many places, at other places these were sealed pending the report of the samples collected.

Over 6,000 kg of fungus infested khoya was seized from the border district of Ferozepur.

In Sangrur district, over 5,000 kg of khoya and sweets were sealed after a raid on a cold storage.

In Phagwara, nearly 1,400 kg of adulterated gur (jaggery) was seized. In Bathinda, another 1,400 kg of spurious ghee in boxes was seized.

The officials said Saturday that nearly 20,000 litres of synthetic milk, which was meant for preparing sweets in the festival season, had been seized so far.

The raids and the campaign against spurious and adulterated products were initiated following orders from Punjab’s Health Minister Laxmi Kanta Chawla.

“We don’t want innocent people to suffer only because some people want to make money through illegal means during the festival season. We will take strict action in this regard,” Chawla said Saturday.

Raids were conducted in Ludhiana and other places as well and huge quantities of prepared sweets, meant to be sold over the next one week, were seized or sealed.

In certain cases, the milk products and the sweets were kept in pathetic conditions. Prepared sweets like rasgullas, gulab-jamuns and milk-cake were kept in dirty containers in most unhygienic conditions.