Thrissur corporation, hotel owners at loggerheads

THRISSUR: The Hotel and Restaurant Owners Association here and the Corporation Health officials are at loggerheads over a telephone conversation circulated through social media after the health inspectors of the civic body conducted raids on two consecutive days last week in view of Thrissur Pooram. The relevant conversation is claimed to be between a health inspector and a hotel owner in which the inspector is heard telling the owner that if the demands of the officials were not properly met, such raids would happen and the name of the hotel would appear in the media for selling sub-standard and stale food.

“The ‘Pooram’(Pooram International Hotel) was asked to ‘meet’ us in the way they should. But, they did not. So they too are facing problems due to the raids just like you,” the health inspector is heard saying in the audio clip. Corporation health supervisor N. Rajan told DC that the authenticity of the clip was unknown and the raids were conducted in such a way that no such scope for inspectors demanding a bribe during raids was given. Mayor Ajitha Jayarajan said that the Cyber Cell would be asked to inquire into the matter on Tuesday to ascertain facts and then if the inspector was found at fault, action would be taken.

Kerala Hotel and Restaurant Owners’ Associations district coordinator TVR Warrier told Deccan Chronicle that the audio could be authentic as the raids conducted by the officials of municipalities and corporations “were for bribes”. “The facts will come out after the cyber cell inquiry. And the association has also raised the issue of the inspectors declaring the food items as stale and sub-standard without any testing and only by looking at the items with bare eyes,” he said.