CHENNAI, July 22: A sample survey of some 5 automatic vending milk (AVM) booths in several localities in the City has brought to light the fact that most of them were short-vending, the quantity varying from 25-55 ml for every half-a-litre of milk and supplying poor quality milk. The AVM functions under Aavin, the government controlled TN Cooperative Milk Producers' Federation. Under the short-vending racket, consumers buying one litre milk on average stand to lose one rupee per day, while the AVM franchisees selling about 1000 litres stand to gain atleast Rs 1000 every day in the process. With 202 AVMs supply about 1.87 lakh litres of milk daily, the total money involved in the racket is likely to be about Rs 30 lakh every month. The short-vending concessionaries are left free by paying a fine of Rs 500 to Rs 1500 which puts to waste the efforts of top officials. Another shocking revealtion is that these booths franchised to ex-service men and unemployed youth are in reality under the control of 'benami' opertors who have a political backing.

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