July 20: In a case of utter negligence by a drinking water bottling plant, insect larvae and algae have been found in a water jar produced by the plant at a time when cholera outbreak is feared in Kathmandu Valley.    
This level of negligence was observed during the monitoring of various drinking water bottling plants operated at Jhaukhel, Changunarayan Municipality-3 in Bhaktapur district. The monitoring was conducted under the leadership of Assistant Chief District Officer Madhav Prasad Sharma.    
The monitoring team of the District Administration Office, Bhaktapur has destroyed the old bottles and jars with layer of algae inside them.

A team comprising representatives from the Department of Food Technology and Quality Control, the Consumers Welfare Federation, the District Cottage Industries Office, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry and other stakeholders, and journalists carried out the monitoring and found negligence on part of drinking water bottling plants.

The District Administration Office conducted the monitoring after increasing public complaints that worms and algae were found inside various brands of jars containing drinking water.    
The assistant chief district officer Sharma said that old jars numbering in hundreds found in course of onsite monitoring have been destroyed. He said the water bottling plants committing such negligence have been reprimanded and legal action would be initiated if they repeated such negligence.    
Samples of water have been collected from two water plants in course of the monitoring and the samples have been forwarded to the concerned department for lab examination. -- RSS