Basmati freed from dirty hands

A Swargate police team led by inspector Dara Irani and sub-inspector Nandakumar Pardeshi, which carried out the raid, seized huge quantity of rice estimated at over Rs 3.26 lakh from the godown.

The godown was sealed after the owner of Rameshwardas Gopiram Agarwal company, Shyam Rameshwar Agarwal, from Raviwar Peth and his four servants were arrested.

Among the arrested servants were Praksh Shankar Godmbe 25 of Shahu Vasahat area of Laxminagar, Rajendra Prasd Tambekr 30 of Sukhsagarnagar near Katraj, Bashir Abdul Razzak Sayyed 28 and Shabbir Kutubuddin Sayyed 21 both of Padmavati.

According to inspector Irani, Agarwal had purchased premium quality processed Basmati rice, Tibar and Dubar of Picric, Ketve and Kohinoor brands. He and his servants were allegedly mixing inferior quality 8220;Sharbati8221; rice as well as duplicate Basmati rice in it.

Agarwal is suspected to be selling adulterated Basmati rice for the several months. He used to sell mixture of premium quality Basmati rice and inferior quality rice as pure Basmati rice, police said. Agarwal and his employees were mixing the superior and inferior quality rice in equal quantities when his godown was raided, according to the police officials.

The officials from the Hariyana based rice processing company had kept a watch on Agarwal8217;s activities for almost a year after receiving a tip off that their rice was being adulterated in Pune. This is second incident in which adulteration of rice has come to light in Gultekdi Market Yard area. About a year back, a godown located in the Market Yard was raided and a racket allegedly indulged in adulterating rice which was to be sold at fair prices to the Adivasis in Thane district was busted, police said.