Legal Metrology department to continue special raids in the days to come

Bakeries, LPG cylinder dealers and shopping malls including Inorbit and Big Bazar in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh were the biggest offenders in terms of cheating customers, according to data from the Legal Metrology Department.

A special drive by the department showed that out of a total number of 1,901 cases, 987 cases alone were registered against these three establishments.

Cracking the whip against retail outlets and other businesses for breaking rules, the department here also filed another 71 cases in courts against many shops between November 1, 2013 and June 9, 2014, after the special raids were conducted following complaints made.

Of the 1,901 cases, the highest were booked against bakeries (341), LPG cylinder dealers (341), and shopping malls (305) for offences such as non-declaration of the maximum retail price on packaged items, cheating customers by giving them lesser quantities and short-filling of cylinders among others.

Even shopping malls were up in the list with 305 cases against big time malls for non-declaration of MRP and other offences. Manufacturers and dealers of weights and measures also were booked for selling instruments which did not have approval from the Govt. of India and for not maintaining records of their returns to show officials for scrutiny. Apart from that 147 cases were booked against sweet shops for selling packaged items without MRP, and 185 cases against paddy, cotton and maize traders for using faulty weighing machines. The rest of the bookings were against cement dealers, jewellery shops, steel dealers, hardware dealers, edible oil dealers, petrol pumps, and milk dealers.

Also, 136 separate cases were booked against jewellery shops on Akshaya Tritiya for various offences during the period.

Officials said that another 70 cases were booked against cement companies after June 9 in Telangana alone for short-filling and supplying less quantity than specified on the bags.

“Basically there are anomalies in everything that deals with weights and measures. Citizens need to be vigilant and report such things to us.

Even milk dealers have found ways to give lesser quantities to their customers,” said an official, and added that there will be continuous raids in the coming days as well.

All in all, a total of Rs.3.53 crore was collected as compounding fee for all the 1,901 cases registered against erring traders, of which the highest fee of Rs.2.11 crore was collected from petrol pumps for various offences.