Updated on: Monday, July 20, 2009
Cuddalore: For students to become responsible citizens, they should learn about consumer rights and protection of environment before graduating out of colleges, said K. Rajaram, Commissioner, Civil Supplies and Consumer Protection Department.
Speaking at the inauguration of Citizen Consumer Club at St Joseph’s Arts and Science College, Mr. Rajaram said that owing to lapses in production and service aspects, consumers were facing lot of problems.
Adulteration seemed to be rampant and it was a common knowledge that consumption of adulterated food items would cause health hazards.
He called upon the students to collect samples of food articles such as tea dust, edible oil and chilly powder from provision stores and test them in college laboratories.
If they came across any adverse reports, they should bring it to the notice of the Collector, Mr. Rajaram said.
The 'use-and-throw' culture had degraded environment and spawned problems to civic authorities. For example, the one-time-use pens would create tonnes of garbage and disposal would pose a great challenge. He said that as plastic products were not biodegradable, their usage should be either curtailed or avoided as far as possible.