The Nationwide health awareness campaign ‘Swasth Bharat Yatra-2018’ concluded in the state on Sunday with huge participation of people in a cyclothonuptoLakhanpur border to hand over the baton to Punjab.The rally was flagged-off by Commissioner Food Safety Dr. Abdul Kabir Dar in presence of Track-I Nodal Officer AC Mishra, FSSAI Officials and other Food Safety Officials of J&K.The Cyclothon followed by Prabhat Pheri (Activation) in which locals, NCC cadets and school children, cyclists, volunteers, members of civil society and officials of the commissionerate participated and pledged to eat healthy, eat safe and eat fortified.The Baton with cyclists, crew, Eat Right Mobile Unit, was handed over to the Punjab Team FSSAI Track-I Nodal Officer to travel to Delhi where all the Tracks of the Pan India Cyclothon will culminate.“Swasth Bharat Yatra” which is a key element of the “Healthy India Mission” is aimed to promote the Eat Right India Movement that is aligned with Government’s recent focus on public health through its three key programmes including ‘Ayushman Bharat’, ‘Swachh Bharat Mission’, ‘PoshanAbhiyaan’ and Swasth Bharat Yatra which also has Eat Right Mobile Unit with the motive to build awareness around food safety, combating food adulteration, promoting healthy diets, mobilize the masses and to create a large pool of local community to sustain this movement in the country.
Earlier the awareness campaign was officially launched on October 16 from Leh by Commissionerate of Food Safety J&K in collaboration with FSSAI where Dorje Motup, Chief Executive Counselor of Ladakh formally inaugurated it on the eve of World Food Day 2018, with the theme ‘Eat Safe, Eat Healthy, Eat Fortified and No Food Waste.Throughout the campaign, awareness rallies were carried in each district in which more than 15,000 people participated including 500 cyclists, students from various Educational Institutions and Civil Society Members, Food Safety Officials, NCC Volunteers, Anganwadi Workers, and other people. The campaign was completed in the span of 146 days covering 1600 Kilometres and traversed 28 destinations across the state.The rallies passed through various food markets with cabin crew of ‘Eat Right Mobile Unit’ to sensitize people about food safety measures with slogans ‘Swasth Mai LayegeThodaFarq; Aj Se Kum Karege Tel, CheeniAurNamak’ and display of an audio-visual promotional advertisement on the screen.Besides the cyclothon and activation rallies, Swasth Melas were also held in Srinagar and Jammu wherein, various Food Stalls for the promotion of fortified and organic foods were established by different stakeholders with posters, brochures and flyers to motivate people to be mindful of safe and nutritious food habits.
The participants were given knowledge and information about Dairy, Meat & Meat Products, Food Labelling, detection of Food Adulteration and practices like Street Food Vending, Sanitation, Personal Hygiene, and Disposal of waste material and Hand Washing.Besides, painting competitions on Eat Right India were also organised in collaboration with NGO’s and Educational Institutions, Colleges.Various cultural programmes were also presented by Cultural Teams on the theme of Eat Right India and items like NukadNatak, Songs etc. to encourage the audience for eating healthy, safe and fortified foods and to avoid food wastage.Commenting on the closing ceremony the ‘Healthy India Campaign’, Commissioner Food Safety, Dr. Abdul Kabir Dar said the aim of the campaign was to promote eating safe, healthy and fortified through healthy lifestyle in the consumers. He thanked all the officials of the state for putting their extra efforts to make the campaign a success and assured that officials who performed exceptional work in organising the campaign will be rewarded.