Spurious soft drink unit busted in Odisha's Mancheswar

BHUBANESWAR: A spurious soft drink manufacturing unit was busted in Mancheswar Industrial Estate and one person arrested here on Tuesday.

​On a tip-off, Special Squad officers and Mancheswar police raided the unit and seized over 1,000 litres of spurious cold drinks and soda bottles.

The accused Sripati Ranjan Behera of Sameigadia was operating the unit from December last year without obtaining the trade licence or Food Safety and Standards Authority of India’s certificate. He was manufacturing cold drinks using labels of branded firms and also in the name of unregistered companies.

Police said he was supplying soft drink bottles having labels of Spide Oon, Spyce Oon, Orange Oon, DiFens Soda and Pulp Litchi.

“The packaging of Spide Oon is similar to Sprite while Spyce Oon and DiFens Soda bottles resembled the bottles of Spice Up and Kinley Soda respectively”, said a police officer. He was selling a 600 ml cold drink bottle for Rs 35, 200 ml cold drink bottle for Rs 10 and 300 ml soda for Rs 10.

The adulterated cold drinks were mostly sold in large quantities in rural areas as people may not be able to distinguish between the branded products and duplicate ones.

Apparently, Behera operated the spurious soft drinks manufacturing unit in the Chakeisiani area for two years before shifting the facility to Mancheswar. A case has been registered and the unit sealed. The seized products will be sent to the laboratory for testing.

Last month, police had busted two units involved in manufacturing adulterated sauces and pickles, and ghee in the city.