Oil samples taken from his mill in Modasa were found to be adulterated with argemone seed oil, the adulterant in mustard oil that killed several people in Delhi recently. Sale of the Krishna brand of groundnut oil has been banned.

This is the first case in which argemone seed oil has been found to be used as an adulterant for groundnut oil, which is widely consumed by Gujaratis.

According to Health Minister Ashok Bhatt, all but one of the 13 cases reported so far were from the Sabarkantha district. One was from Godhra in the Panchmahals district. The patients were not serious, he said.

The health department is distributing pamphlets in the affected areas warning the people against use of argemone-adulterated edible oil and the symptoms of dropsy.

Meanwhile, the civil supplies department hasseized around 8,955 kg of lady's finger seed oil from the Krishna Oil Mills. The health department has issued instruction in other districts to look out for Krishna brand oil and seize it wherever found.

Bhatt held an emergency meeting with the health department officials to take stock of the situation and asked the senior officials to take all preventive steps on an urgent basis.

In Kheda district, from where some non-edible oil had been supplied to the prime suspect in the mustard oil adulteration case of Delhi, the collectorate has swung into action. The flood control rooms set up for monsoon have now been asked to warn people against the dangers of consuming adulterated oil.

Kheda collector Bhagyesh Jha said that inquiries revealed that the inedible watermelon-seed oil supplied by Ambika Oil & Cake Industries of the district to Delhi had not been detected in the oil consumed by the dropsy victims from Sabarkantha.

After the collector's meeting with the district chief health officer, districtsupplies officer and additional district magistrate government doctors and mamlatdars have been asked to visit areas where mustard oil is consumed and check for symptoms of dropsy.

The Food & Drugs Control Administration (FDCA) has been asked to take samples of mustard oil from traders and check for adulteration with argemone seed oil.

Meanwhile, relatives of some of the patients undergoing treatment for dropsy at the civil hospital here have alleged that adequate facilities are not being provided to them. In all, eight dropsy patients have been admitted -- four undergoing treatment since Sunday night, while the others were admitted this afternoon.

Incidentally, all the patients, who belong to Dhansura taluka in Sabarkantha district, said they fell ill after eating food fried in the Krishna brand of groundnut oil. Among them is six-year-old Kajal.

Some patients told The Indian Express that though they had been feeling unwell for the last one month, with their feet swelling and heartbeat gettingirregular, local doctors could not trace the cause. When a team of doctors visited their taluka on Sunday and informed them that anybody having swollen feet and irregular heartbeat was suffering from dropsy, they came to know about the disease.

Ramilaben, 40, who is undergoing treatment along with her son Tushar, had told local doctors about swelling in the feet for the past one month, but in vain. ``When I consulted a doctor in the nearby Byed village, he started treating me for high blood pressure,'' Ramila said.

The relatives of the three patients who were brought here on Sunday night alleged that even the basic facilities were not being provided to them by the authorities.

The callousness of the hospital authorities was apparent from the fact that they were lying on the beds kept on the floor. ``We are also forced to purchase some of the expensive medicines and injections from outside as we are not getting these here,'' Tushar's father Chagan Lal alleged. ``It's a big burden on me as I have alreadyspent about Rs 4,000 on my son's treatment''.