Katunayake police have received a complaint over a sum of nearly Rs. 05 million being stolen from hand luggages of several passengers travelling from Sri Lanka to Dubai on a FitsAir flight.

The robbed passengers had included several doctors who were travelling to a medical conference in Dubai.

The loss of the cash, including 15,000 US Dollars and 6,000 Dirhams, had been only discovered after the passengers had disembarked the flight.

Upon complaining to the Dubai police, they were told to lodge complaints with the Bandaranaike International Airport in Katunayake and with the Sri Lanka Police. However, the robber remains at large.

It is said that the flight lacked CCTV cameras and the airline is also attempting to evade the matter despite the victims also complaining to the company office.

However, a day after the incident, a foreigner travelling from Dubai to Colombo was arrested over another inflight theft and according to media reports, the said suspect is said to have travelled in the aforementioned FitsAir flight to Dubai.

When the ‘Lankadeepa’ newspaper made an inquiry from the airline in this regard, they were told that the company cannot comment to the media.

Aberdeen Holdings, which owns FitsAir, is chaired by Sattar Kassim.

The Consumer Affairs Authority (CAA) today (March 13) announced that the Maximum Retail Prices of rice remain unchanged.

The CAA notes that reports have emerged of certain rice mill owners and wholesalers attempting to sell rice at higher prices by misleading retailers into believing that the CAA’s regulated prices have changed, leading to queries whether it is so.

Therefore the MRP remains unchanged and are as below :
Raw red rice – Rs. 220 per kg
Nadu rice – Rs. 230 per kg
Samba rice – Rs. 240 per kg
Keeri Samba rice – Rs. 260 per kg

The CAA further emphasizes that continuous raids and investigations will be conducted islandwide to strictly enforce these price regulations and take legal action against any violators.

The State Pharmaceuticals Corporation (SPC) has lodged a complaint with the Ministry of Health (MoH) over the purchase of 38,000 Dinoprostone 3mg vaginal tablets from a supplier who quoted a higher price.

This pharmaceutical order was called under tender number DHS/P/WW/254/25.

Klintas (Pvt) Ltd., the lowest bidder, quoted a price of Rs.1,190.00 per tablet, amounting to a total of Rs.45 million.

Meanwhile, Nabiqasim, a Karachi-based company in Pakistan, offered a price of Rs.1,628.54 per tablet, totaling Rs.61 million.

Klintas (Pvt) Ltd., the lower bidder, has pointed out that the tender board awarded the contract to Nabiqasim, despite it being the highest bidder.

Accordingly, the decision had resulted in a financial loss of Rs.17 million.

The SPC usually ensures drug quality before registering them with the National Medicines Regulatory Authority (NMRA), as part of the tender awarding process.

The approval for this particular tender was reportedly granted by the Managing Director of the SPC.

The complaint has been forwarded to Deputy Health Minister – Hansaka Wijemuni, Health Secretary Dr. Anil Jasinghe, and SPC Chairman – Manuj Weerasinghe.

The initial complaint was filed on February 18th, and due to a lack of investigation or response, a reminder was sent on March 06th.