While authorities in Kohima and Mokokchung have taken peremptory step against sale of fishes suspected to be injected with formalin to prevent deterioration during the ten to fifteen-day journey from the sources such as in South or North India; authorities in Dimapur have not taken any such step as per the government ban against sale of imported fish varieties on the plea that laboratory tests would decide the issue.
Earlier on Monday, DMC team went on fish sample collection drive at New Market and Railway Bazaar. On Tuesday, the team landed at the auction venue near Sub-Urban Police Station at Signal Basti. The team led by veterinary assistant surgeon, Dr. Sentimoa Longkumer and deputy director (V&AH), Dr. Sentinungla collected samples from the fish auction venue on Tuesday.
The entire exercise contrasted sharply with the preventive measures at Kohima and Mokokchung where fishes from outside were banned till cleared for sale. The DMC team will be sending the samples of imported fish varies for test for formalin in the mobile laboratory van which is presently stationed in Kohima.
It may be pertinent to point out that fishes imported from far away states for consumers in Nagaland pass through Dimapur. KMC on Monday detected formalin from the fishes and after seizing the entire lot of over 5000 kgs, destroyed all of them. Dr. Sentimoa Longkumer informed Nagaland Post that the samples collected from the auction centre would be sent to the mobile testing unit at Kohima. He added that even fish traders had taken out fish samples from the same boxes from which the DMC team had collected and would send them separately to Guwahati for tests.
Speaking to this Reporter, Inakhu Chophy of Dhanbad Fish Suppliers said DMC team should have first collected samples from the main auction venue and not randomly from traders. Other traders present at the auction centre also informed that they were regularly issued inspection certificates-cum-slips by DMC, certifying the fish being sold as fit for human consumption. The receipts were issued for 10 and 20 rupees.
Inakhu also claimed that fish suppliers at Signal Basti possessed necessary documents from suppliers in Andhra Pradesh clearly stating that the fish transported to Nagaland had not been treated with any harmful chemical.
Photo copies of the documents were also submitted to the veterinary doctors attached to DMC. Even as traders in Kohima were found guilty of using formalin in fish, the suppliers and traders in Dimapur have stood their ground.