Disclosing this here at a press conference on Sunday, the State Health and Family Welfare Minister Ashok Bhatt said the factory was raided by the FDCD officials on last Wednesday.

He said that though the FDCD officials had been aware that spurious jeera was being sold in the market, they remained clueless about its source. Then inquiries revealed that the adulterated stuff was being produced in the Santosh Danadar Factory in Unjha, in the Mehsana district. A large quantity of the adulterated jeera had already been sold in the markets.

The minister said that on receiving complaints from several merchants, the food and drugs control administration had set to work, trying to locate the source of the adulterated jeera.

Finally, they had homed in on the factory in Unjha.

Bhatt revealed that what the factory was packing in the name of cumminseed was a dangerous mixture of clay, cement, colouring substance, a cheap variety of saunf, and another substance used for manufacturing talcum powder. The adulterants were found stored in the factory in large quantities.

The saunf was being ground and then mixed in the adulterated stuff to give the final appearance of jeera. The saunf used for adulterating the jeera was available in the market for Rs 12 per kilogram. But the final product was being sold as jeera for Rs 60 per kilogram.

The health minister said that on a complaint filed by FDCD officials, the Unjha police station has registered a case against the factory owner Govindbhai Somabhai Patel under sections 420, 513, 511, 272, 273 and 604 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). He said the factory had yet not been sealed as further investigations in the case were on, and that once that was complete, it would be sealed.

In an another disclosure, Bhatt said the health department officials had also recovered the spurious drugs worth Rs 8 lakh from the Chatral based Adivil Pharmaceutical Company last Monday.