The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) on February 21, 2024, issued an advisory related to the Time-bound processing of applications for Licenses marked for inspections.
The following has been stated:
• It has stated that No pre-license inspections shall be conducted in cases other than those mentioned in the Order for Risk-Based Inspection.
• In the case where the Designated officer believes that it is necessary to inspect non-mandatory categories, he/she shall record the reason in writing with clear justification.
• Moreover, once an application is marked for inspection in non-mandatory categories, inspection should be done within 15 days. In case, the inspection is not conducted within 15 days, DO should recall the application back to the Document Scrutiny Stage in FoSCoS and grant the License.
• In a case where the DO still believes that an inspection is necessary to be conducted before granting the license, he/she can reassign the inspection to another FSO or himself/herself for immediate inspection without any further delay.
• It has requested that Commissioners of Food Safety of States / UTs and Directors of Regional Offices, FSSAI shall monitor the pendency of licensing applications under their jurisdiction through the FoSCoS Dashboard and instruct the concerned licensing authorities to strictly adhere to the timelines and orders issued by FSSAI from time to time.
[Notification No RCD-11004/1/2020-Regulatory-FSSAI]
