Chennai: The recent Aavin milk scam has brought the quality of the supplier under the scanner raising questions about the nutritional value of the milk. Though the brand is still rated higher compared to the produce of private milk suppliers, sources in the state animal husbandry department admit that there is a lot of adulteration and value addition killing the basic nutrients of milk and that this has been the practice since the 90s.
As a thickening agent Aavin adds melted butter blocks brought in from Salem and skimmed milk powder imported from Mathura, Maharashtra and Madurai. “In case of private dairy units, the packet milk you consume consists Sodium bi carbonate, a chemical used in dairy plants to neutralize the acidity and increase shelf life. There are also cases in Thiruvannamalai and Coimbatore where private players add tapioca to thicken the milk and there have been cases in the past where urea and nitrogen mixture has been added to the dairy plant”, the source who is an expert in dairy processing said seeking anonymity.
Aavin officials say that there are a set of 19 tests done and only after the specified standards are met does the milk reache customers. “The issue is that the milk is adulterated before its reaches our dairy units and after value addition and pasteurization, only the best standardized milk is supplied to our customers,” explains an official. “Besides new special squads have been formed comprising general managers to check out the procured milk quality en route to our dairy units.
Till date, the customers are with us and the daily supply has not dipped from the total capacity of 11.5 lakh litres per day.” Besides quality checks, Aavin also has a vigilance team that is required to check irregularities. “There is a post of chief vigilance officer for Aavin and police officers are posted to look into complaints,” says Poonga Nagar Selvam, an Aavin dealer.
“But the police personnel often treat the post as a punishment job and fail to streamline the illegalities. If the vigilance cell had been doing its duty, the scam could have been prevented some year’s ago.” Another issue the milk producer has been facing is that due to lack of punctuality and private competition in the recent years, the number of automatic Aavin booths have come down to 65 from 215 booths, with consumers preferring milk sachets.
