Three separate consumer-protection and food-safety prosecutions concluded in Sri Lankan magistrate’s courts on Thursday, 10 September, each ending in a guilty plea and a fine.
Rs. 750,000 for a Rs. 30 overcharge
Amirtham Restaurant in Valachchenai was fined Rs. 750,000 by the Valachchenai Magistrate’s Court for selling a one-litre bottle of drinking water at Rs. 130, against the maximum retail price of Rs. 100 set by the Consumer Affairs Authority.
The case was filed by CAA investigation officers for the Batticaloa district after a raid on 4 June 2026, and the defendant company pleaded guilty, the Daily Mirror reported.
The fine is 25,000 times the Rs. 30 overcharge that produced it — a ratio worth stating plainly, because it shows the penalty attaches to breaching a gazetted price control rather than to the sum taken from the customer.
Rs. 200,000 for an expired tea packet
A private company was fined Rs. 200,000 by Colombo Additional Magistrate Darshima Premaratne after pleading guilty to selling a consumer a 400g tea packet marked with an expiry date of 15 July 2026 for Rs. 1,000, Hiru News reported.
The CAA brought the case under Direction No. 52 of Extraordinary Gazette No. 1875/38 of 15 August 2014, which bars manufacturers, importers, distributors, suppliers and traders from storing expired goods, or goods unfit for sale or human consumption, alongside or among stock offered for sale.
Rs. 104,000 on 32 charges
A businessman from Kelaniya was fined Rs. 104,000 by the Maligakanda Additional Magistrate after pleading guilty to 32 charges, including using bottle packaging containing a glass marble and using an antioxidant prohibited in Sri Lanka, Hiru News reported.
The charges followed the seizure of a food stock being transported for sale in the Jinthupitiya area of Colombo. Public Health Inspectors said the consignment contained drinks stoppered with glass marbles as well as items using banned antioxidants. The court ordered the entire seized stock destroyed to keep it out of the food chain.
Two enforcement regimes, one day
The first two cases are Consumer Affairs Authority prosecutions — pricing and expired stock. The third is a public health prosecution brought on inspectors’ evidence, a separate regime with separate offences. They are not a single campaign, and no outlet presents them as one; what they show is both regimes reaching court on the same day.
An earlier bottled-water pricing case ran on the same MRP breach, when a Meenagaya Express vendor was fined for overcharging.
The CAA asked consumers to report overpricing and other exploitation on 1977 during office hours.
Not reported
None of the three reports names the fine’s statutory maximum, so it is not possible to say where each penalty sits in the available range. The company in the tea case is not named, nor is the Kelaniya businessman. No report says whether the Valachchenai restaurant remains open, what quantity of expired tea was in stock, or how large the seized Jinthupitiya consignment was.
