Maharashtra: Hotel owner fined Rs 5,000 for using plastic food wrap

After imposing fines on a civic official and a BJP corporator for using plastic material, the city's new municipal commissioner has slapped a fine on a hotel owner for use of plastic in his premises.

Aurangabad Municipal Commissioner Astik Kumar Pandey during an inspection along with his team in Samarthnagar on Wednesday found that a hotel in the area was using plastic for wrapping food items. Pandey ordered his team members to slap a fine of Rs 5,000 on the hotel owner, an official said on Thursday.

Pandey, who took charge on Monday, had imposed a fine of Rs 5,000 on a civic official who came to welcome him with a bouquet that had plastic wrapping. The official, an assistant director in the town planning department, had to pay the fine amount on the spot.

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On Tuesday, BJP corporator Manisha Munde presented a pen packed in a gift paper to Pandey. The civic chief slapped a fine of Rs 5,000 on her also for using the wrapper.

Government offices across the country have been making efforts to ban single-use plastic items from their premises after a call for their elimination was made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his Independence Day speech this year.

In June last year, the Maharashtra government imposed a ban on a variety of plastic products, including single-use disposable items, and started penalising all those found using them.

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It banned the manufacturing, use, sale, distribution, and storage of plastic materials such as bags, spoons, plates and other disposable items. The ban also included packaging material and thermocol.