TULSIRAM Vs. STATE OF MADHYA PRADESH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) On 17-8-1979 the Food Inspector, Sorar, purchased 375 grams of Soyabean oil from the shop of the petitioner, Tulsiram. The Soyabean oil purchased was divided into three parts; each part was filled in a bottle; each bottle was sealed; and, one of the bottles was sent to the Public Analyst, Raipur for analysis The Public Analyst found that the sample was adulterated as it contained traces of cotton seed oil. On 29-11-1979 a complaint was filed on the basis of the, report of the Public Analyst, in the court of the Judicial First Class Magistrate Balod. On 17-12-1979 a copy of the report of the Public Analyst was forwarded to the petitioner as required by Rule 9-A of Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules. The accused-petitioner however made no application to the trial Court to have one of the samples sent to the Central Food Laboratory for further analysis. He was content merely to deny offence. After due trial he was convicted by the Magistrate on 8-9-1982, under S. 16(1)(a)(i) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act and sentenced to suffer rigorous imprisonment for six months and to pay a fine of Rs. 1,000/-. The appeal preferred by the petitioner to the Sessions Judge; Durg and the Revision Petition preferred thereafter to the High Court of Madhya Pradesh were rejected. The petitioners now seeks special leave to appeal to this Court under Article 136 of the Constitution.

(2.) The learned counsel for the petitioner urged before us that Rule 9-A of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, which has been substituted for Rule 9(j) in 1977, now prescribes that the Local (Health) Authority shall immediately after the institution of the prosecution forward a copy of the report of the Public Analyst by registered post or by hand to the person from whom the sample was taken by the Food Inspector, that the word 'immediately' occurring in Rule 9-A showed that it brooked no delay and that as there was a delay of 18 days, in the present case, in forwarding the report to the petitioner, the prosecution was vitiated and the petitioner was entitled to be acquitted. He argued that the scheme of the Act was changed by the amendments introduced in 1976 And that in consonance with the revised scheme of the Act, the rules were also amended. He invited our attention to the departure in the language of the present Rule 9-A from the language of old Rule 9(j), The learned counsel also argued that cotton seed oil was more nutritive and consumable than Soyabean oil and, therefore, a person mixing cotton seed oil with Soyabean oil could not be said to have adulterated Soyabean oil. He invited our attention to Dal Chand v. Municipal Corporation, Bhopal AIR 1983 SC 303, Kashmiri Lal v. State of Haryana (1981) 2 FAC 167 Kanda Swami v. Food Inspector (1982) 1 FAC 322 State of Maharashtra v. Tukaram Babu Rao Mane (1982) 1 FAC 398 Perumal v. Kumbakonam Municipality (1982) 2 FAC 106 (Mad); and Food Inspector v. Prabhakaran, (1983) 1 FAC 84. We have considered all of them and. we do not think it necessary to launch into a discussion of the cases, one by one, We would rather refer to and construe the relevant statutory provisions and rules ourselves. Suffice to say here that we do not agree with the submissions of the learned counsel.

(3.) It is true, in 1976 important changes were made in some of the procedural provisions of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act. We are concerned in this case with some of the changes made in Ss. 11 and 13 of the Act and the new Rules made as a consequence. Before the 1976 amendment, S. 11 required the Food Inspector taking a sample for analysis to separate the sample into three parts, seal or fasten up each part and to deliver one of the parts to the person from whom the sample was taken, send another part for analysis to the Public Analyst and retain the third part for production in case legal proceedings were taken or for analysis by the Director of the Central Food Laboratory under sub-section (2) of S. 13 as the case might be. Sub-section (1) of old S. 13 (as if stood before 1976) required the Public Analyst to deliver to the Food Inspector a report of the analysis of any article of food submitted to, him for such analysis. Sub-section (2) enabled the accused vendor, after the institution of the prosecution under the Act, to apply to the Court to send the part given to him or the part retained with the Food Inspector for production in case of legal proceedings, to the Director of the Central Food Laboratory for a certificate Specifying the result of the analysis to be made by him. The certificate issued by the Director of the Central Food Laboratory was to supersede the report given by the Public Analyst and was to be final and conclusive evidence of the facts stated therein. Rule 90) of the 1955 Rules prescribed that it shall be the duty of the Food Inspector to send by registered post, a copy of the report of the Public Analyst to the person from whom the sample was taken within ten days of the receipt of the said report.