Ramkrishan Upadhyay
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, September 24
Next time you go to any restaurant or hotel, you can judge the cleanliness of its premises by the grading displayed on a board. In a bid to improve hygiene in restaurants and hotels, the UT Health Department, in partnership with hotels, will soon start grading and ranking restaurants according to their hygiene standards.
Sources said the ranking would be based on scores obtained in an assessment. The Health Department has already circulated a checklist among hoteliers on the basis of which their cleanliness will be judged. The move is part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
The pro forma distributed among restaurants and hotels contains 100 points. Teams comprising officers of the Health Department and representatives of the hotel industry will be constituted, which will judge them on the basis of facilities for which points will be given.
The focus will be on hygiene in the kitchen, washing room, food storage area and dining rooms. Gurvinder Juneja, secretary of the Chandigarh Hotel and Restaurant Association, said the association had decided to honour those who would bag the top three rankings.
He said all hotels would be given certificates and their grading would be decided on the basis of the points obtained by them.
Sukhvinder Singh, designated officer, Department of Food and Safety, said the drive would generate awareness among workers of the hospitality industry who prepare food and "this will ultimately lead to a healthy society".
Sources said around 350 licences for food had been issued to hotels, dhabas and restaurants and all of them would be covered under the drive.
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