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Judgment
Hon''ble Servesh Kumar Gupta, J.—By way of this Criminal Miscellaneous Application, the applicant has assailed the order of cognizance dated 6.1.2006, passed by the learned Magistrate in Criminal Case No. 15/06, Food Inspector v. Jitendra Kumar Baweja and Ors.. By the said order, the learned Magistrate took cognizance of the offence punishable u/s 7/16 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 (for short, hereinafter referred to as the ''Act'') against the applicant and two other accused.
The background facts of the case are that Food Inspector Sri R.K. Agarwal (Respondent No. 3), by exercising his powers under the Act, took samples of the Tata Salt in the form of three packets, each containing one kilogram salt, by paying rupees twenty four towards the cost of the same to Jitendra Kumar Baweja, who runs his retail shop at Civil Lines, Roorkee. It was revealed that the said Tata Salt was supplied by the manufacturer Sovereign Traders (accused No. 3) to M/s Bandari & Brothers (wholesaler at Roorkee), who in turn supplied the same to Jintendra Kumar Baweja for vending it directly to the customers. Food Inspector sent one of the samples to the Lucknow based Government Public Analyst for testing its purity. The laboratory, after testing the same, found that this Tata Salt was not adulterated, but noticed that the manufacturer had not mentioned the batch and lot number on its label stick upon the packet. This was the violation of Rule 32 of the rules made under the Act. So, the Food Inspector filed this complaint in the court of competent jurisdiction against all the three accused i.e. retailer, wholesaler and the manufacturer. Having received this complaint, the learned Magistrate took cognizance of the offence and passed the impugned order.
Learned Counsel for the applicant has submitted that the cognizance order has been passed against the applicant for the breach of Rule 32(e) made under the Act, which has been struck down by the Full Bench of the Hon''ble Apex Court by its judgment dated 23.4.1971, rendered in case of Dwarka Nath and Anr. v. The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (Criminal Appeal No. 264 of 1968). I have carefully gone through the said authority. The Hon''ble Apex Court at paragraph 23 of the said judgment has observed as under:
There is no definition of the expression "batch number" or "code number" either in the Act or the Rules. It is also admitted that even assuming that the batch or code number has to be given, there is no further obligation to specify in the label the date of packing and manufacture of the article of food or the period within which the article of food has to be utilized, used or consumed. In the absence of any obligation to give the particulars mentioned by us above, the public or the purchaser will not be able to find out even the freshness of the contents of a container. Therefore, it follows that merely giving an artificial batch number or code number will not be of any use to the public or to the purchaser. In view of all these circumstances we are of the opinion that Rule 32(e) is beyond the rule making power even u/s 23(1)(d) of the Act. The Appellants could not be convicted for any violation of Clause (e) of rule 32 as the said provision as pointed out above, is invalid.
4.Since the Rule 32(e), the violation of which has been alleged by the Food Inspector, has already been struck down by the Hon''ble Apex Court way back in the year 1971, therefore, no trial for the violation of the same could be allowed to proceed. Needless to say that the salt which was taken by the Food Inspector for testing was found to be pure and unadulterated by the Public Analyst.
In view of the above, the impugned cognizance order cannot be sustained and the same is liable to be quashed. Consequently, the petition is allowed. The impugned order of cognizance dated 6.1.2006 as well as the entire proceedings of the Criminal Case No. 15/06, Food Inspector v. Jitendra Kumar Baweja and Ors., u/s 7/16 of the Act, is hereby quashed.
Registry is directed to inform the court concerned accordingly.