Amaravati, February 25: Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu told the State Assembly that organised syndicates supplied 59.71 lakh kg of spurious ghee worth ₹234.51 crore to Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams between 2019 and 2024.
He said tender rules were relaxed in early 2020 to favour ineligible suppliers, lab reports were ignored or suppressed, and bribes including ₹4.5 crore to a former TTD chairman's aide, helped pass adulterated material containing vegetable oils and chemicals.
Lab tests from 2022 and 2024 confirmed adulterants like beta-sitosterol and animal fat traces in some samples, though later probes focused on synthetic mimics rather than dairy purity lapses.
