ISLAMABAD:
A senior government official shocked members of a National Assembly committee on Monday when he told them that most of imported packed food items being sold in the country contained Haram ingredients.
The Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Science and Technology, Mian Ijaz, presented a list of 19 such items containing Haram ingredients.
The products are: two brands of Chicken Tonight (imported from Holland), Bubblicious (UK), Chupa Bubble (Holland), Pascual Yogikids (Spain), three brands of Skittle Fruit (UK), Picnic Chicken (USA), Slima Soup (UK), Knorr Chicken Soup (France), Cup A Soup (UK), Tulip Chicken (Denmark), Rice Chicken Broccoli (USA), Pasta Chicken Broccoli (USA), Pasta Creamy Chicken (US), Heinz Dinner Chicken (England), Jell-O (US) and Pop Tarts (USA).
The items, according to the ministry’s data, contain ingredients like white and red wine, gelatine and E120 (animal-based food colour). Some of the food items containing chicken have been placed in the list due to “doubts” about the “slaughtering mechanism” since “stunning is prohibited” in Islam.
The members were told that the ministry intended to see establishment of the Pakistan Halal authority through an act of parliament to promote imports and exports and inter-provincial trade and commerce in Halal items and processes.
The ministry’s officials had been called by the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Science and Technology headed by Tariq Bashir Cheema, of the PML-Q, for a briefing on a notice moved by JUI-F MNA Shahida Akhtar and other party members in the assembly in November last year regarding “the sale and purchase of prohibited edible items in the country”.