Essential prices, including mutton, are rising without cause due to a lack of market inspections. This enables dishonest traders to exploit consumers. Onus is now on newly appointed Commissioner of the Food, Civil Supplies, and Consumer Affairs (FCS&CA) Deptt and Directors of Kashmir and Jammu divisions”
For decades, Jammu and Kashmir’s Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs (FCS&CA) Department maintained a crucial practice—market inspections to ensure fair pricing and quality control of essential commodities. These checks were not just bureaucratic rituals; they were the frontline defence against profiteering, adulteration, and exploitation of ordinary consumers. Yet, for the last four years, this mechanism has been inexplicably suspended, leaving the markets of the Union Territory largely unregulated. The consequences are visible and disturbing. The recent uproar over rotten meat recovered in Srinagar and other parts of the Valley is only the latest in a series of incidents that underline the urgent need for restored oversight. Prices of essentials, including mutton, often fluctuate without credible justification. In the absence of routine market inspections, unscrupulous traders have a freer hand, and the ordinary citizen has no effective institutional safeguard. The responsibility to reverse this drift now falls squarely on the newly appointed Commissioner of the FCS&CA Department and the Directors of the Kashmir and Jammu divisions. Their immediate task must be to revive market checking practices without delay. Anything less would be a dereliction of duty to the very consumers they are mandated to protect. A transparent, publicly visible schedule of inspections—covering slaughterhouses, mutton markets, wholesale depots, and retail outlets—would send a clear message that the era of regulatory complacency is over. However, reviving past practices, while necessary, may not be enough.
“The “mutton row” is more than a price dispute; it’s a sign of a larger failure in regulatory oversight. Reinforcing market inspections is an ethical duty, not a bureaucratic choice. Consumers in Jammu and Kashmir have a right to safe, fairly priced, and honestly traded food. The government has the tools to ensure this—the only remaining question is whether they have the will to use them.”
Market regulation in J&K has always suffered from a lack of statutory muscle. That is why a more lasting solution would be to legislate these inspection protocols in the J&K Assembly, making them legally mandatory with clear accountability provisions. Such a law should outline not just the frequency of checks, but also the penalties for non-compliance by traders and negligence by enforcement officers. This is where the political responsibility of the Minister for Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs becomes paramount. He must ensure that policy promises translate into legal guarantees for consumers. Parallel to this, the role of the J&K Food Safety Department must come under sharper scrutiny. Even after the discovery of rotten meat in Srinagar and elsewhere in the Valley, there has been no visible intensification of inspections in hotels, restaurants, and eateries. This is a glaring lapse. Food safety is not merely a matter of consumer rights—it is a matter of public health. Inaction in this area risks not only economic exploitation but also serious health crises. The “mutton row” is therefore more than a price dispute; it is a symptom of a deeper breakdown in regulatory vigilance. Restoring and strengthening market inspections is not a bureaucratic option—it is an ethical imperative. Consumers in Jammu and Kashmir deserve assurance that the food on their plate is safe, fairly priced, and honestly traded. The machinery to deliver that assurance exists. The only question now is whether those in charge will have the will to set it in motion again.
Shafqat Bukhari
