After Muzaffarnagar, UP govt extends across state order on Kanwar Yatra route eateries

Lucknow: Days after the Muzaffarnagar police asked all eateries along the Kanwar Yatra route to display their owners' names, the Uttar Pradesh government on Friday extended the controversial order across the state.

The order issued on Monday has been slammed by opposition parties and members of the ruling alliance, who say it targets Muslim traders.

An Uttar Pradesh government spokesperson said a formal order is likely to be issued soon.

On Monday, Muzaffarnagar police ordered all eateries along the Kanwar Yatra route to display the names of their owners to avoid any "confusion".

"About 240 kilometres of Kanwar Yatra route falls in the district. All the eateries, including hotels, dhabas and carts, on the route have been asked to display the names of their proprietors or those working on these shops," Muzaffarnagar police chief Abhishek Singh said.

"This has been done to ensure that there should be no confusion among kanwariyas and no law-and-order situation arises. All are following this voluntarily," he had told reporters then.

Justifying the move, V K Mishra, in-charge of the weights and measures department of Meerut, said that as per the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, every restaurant and dhaba 'sanchalak' (person running the eatery unit) needed to display the name of the firm, the owner's name and the licence number.