Health Is Wealth
Formalin is a chemical used to preserve dead bodies in mortuaries. However, fishmongers are using this chemical to prevent the fish from rotting away. They would lift the fish gill cover and inject formalin into the fish.
Recently, 5 tons of formalin injected fish have been seized from several trucks in Nagaland by Food Safety Officer (FSO).
Previously, tobacco and smoked meat were blamed for the spread of cancer in the NE region of India. But recent studies have shown that fish imported to this region, from mainland India, contain formalin which leads to cancer.
Picture this in your mind. The Naga indigenous sitting in their respective kitchens and feasting on dead fishes, which have been preserved in formalin, for the past 30 plus years. Remember, the non local fish, Pankaj for example, did not appear in the local markets till the late 1980’s.
The indigenous people have been exploited in politics as much as in economy. After statehood under India, have the indigenous been consuming “Formalinised” politics of India, besides consuming formalin the poisonous germicide and preservative chemical?
Now, we all know that fishes caught in our own rivers rot in a single day; how could then the fishes transported from Andhra Pradesh or West Bengal reach Nagaland fresh even after 4-5 days across scorching India? Now, we have the answer: Formalin.
References
5280 kg formalin-injected fish seized in Kohima