Shrestha Kirana has been accused of cheating buyers of Knorr brand soup packets by not providing them the free gifts offered by the importer. On Monday, a market inspection team from the DoCSM found that stickers had been affixed on the soup packets to hide the notice about the gift scheme.

“It was using fake stickers to cover the announcement about the ‘buy two get one free’ offer being provided to buyers of Knorr soup,” said Ratnesh Shahi, monitoring officer at the department.

According to the importer Matrix Distributor, they have been running the scheme on the packed soup from Hindustan Unilever for the last two months. The company’s Deepak Saraogi said that they had notified the DoCSM following complaints from customers.

According to him, Shrestha Kirana has been earning an extra Rs75 on every three packets of the soup by not giving customers the free gift they were entitled to.

On Friday, the DoCSM had asked Shyam Krishna Shrestha, the proprietor of Shrestha Kirana, to provide an explanation, but he did not do so. According to the DoCSM, it will file a case against Shrestha on a charge of black marketing.

Meanwhile, the DoCSM has moved to file a case against Namuna for selling substandard dairy products. The department had found that the ghee being sold by the dairy did not meet the Reichert-Meissl-Wollny value during its inspection three months ago.

The measure is used to assess the presence of non-fat compounds like fatty acid in edible fats. The lab test report of the Department of Food Technology and Quality Control shows that the ghee contained only 25.43 units of the Reichert-Meissl-Wollny value while the standard for the component is at least 28 units.

Besides selling adulterated ghee, Namuna has been accused of operating a business without obtaining a licence.

According to the DoCSM official, the department will file a case under the Consumers Welfare Act against the dairy at the Kathmandu District Court after fulfilling the necessary process.