FOOD INSPECTOR KOZHIKODE Vs. MUTHUSWAMY NADAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE appellant is the Food Inspector of the Kozhikode Municipality and the appeal is against an order of acquittal. THE respondent is a manufacturer and dealer in sweet-meats. On 1st July 1960 the appellant purchased from the respondent some sweets from the stock manufactured for sale. A sample of the sweet was sent for analysis to the public Analyst who certified that the said sample contained a type of coaltar dye not permitted to be used in food under the rules and was therefore adulterated. THE learned District Magistrate, Kozhikode who tried the case, refused to act on the certificate as in his opinion it was too vague and general and did not even indicate the particular variety of coaltar dye that was found in the article analysed.

(2.) ACCORDING to the learned counsel for the appellant the view taken by the Magistrate that the opinion of the Analyst is too vague and general to be acted upon is erroneous. It is also argued that in the face of r. 28 which enumerates the varieties of coaltar dyes or mixtures thereof which can be used the Analyst when he found that the sample contained coaltar dye other than the permitted varieties, was not bound to pursue the matter further and specify the particular variety of coaltar dye that was used. He would contend for the position that the remedy of the accused if he were dissatisfied with the report would have been either to file an application as provided for in S. 13 (2) of the Act for sending the sample to the Central Food Laboratory for further analysis, or to have challenged the correctness of the opinion of the Public Analyst by citing him as a witness and examining him in Court.

(3.) I would have been inclined to send back the case for fresh disposal for the examination of the Analyst but considering the fact that the transaction is almost two years old I am not doing it.