GUJARAT POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD Vs. RUSHABH INDUSTRIES

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Criminal Revision Application, at the instance of the Gujarat Pollution Control Board, Gandhinagar, is directed against the impugned judgment and order dated 5th November, 1993 rendered in Criminal Case No. 1406 of 1991, passed by the learned Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Ahmedabad, wherein the respondent - Rushabh Dye-Chem Industries, situated at G.I.D.C. Estate, Vatva, Ahmedabad, and two of its partners who came to be prosecuted for the alleged offences under Secs. 37 and 39 of the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981, were ordered to be "discharged".

(2.) On going through the impugned judgment, it appears that the learned Magistrate has ordered discharge of the respondents mainly on two grounds, viz., that during the inquiry before framing of the charge when the complainant came to be examined on oath, he failed to produce on record firstly, the copy of notification in question dated 6th August, 1984 declaring Ahmedabad as a pollution controlled area, published in Government Gazette and secondly, two local daily newspapers publicizing the said notification. 2.1 Now, these two grounds, according to Mr. B. R.Gupta, the learned Advocate appearing for the petitioner-Board, being ex-facie unwarranted and illegal, the impugned order of discharge deserves to be quahsed and set aside atonce and the case be remanded to the trial Court to be disposed of on merits according to law, after framing the charge.

(3.) Having heard Mr. Gupta and the learned A.P.P. Mr. J. A. Shelat, and taking into consideration the facts and circumstances of the case available at hand on record, the short but none-the-less important question that arises for consideration in this Criminal Revision Application is "Whether despite the fact that during the course of recording evidence for the limited purpose of "framing the charge", though the complainant did specifically state on oath that "Ahmedabad has been declared as a pollution controlled area" and that the said fact has been duly publicized in Government Gazette vide Notification dated 6-8-1984, and thereby further publicized in two local daily newspapers, merely because the copies of the said documents in question were not brought on the record the said inadvertent technical lapse at this stage of proceedings standing by itself can be said to be ipso facto fatal to the prosecution justifying the learned Magistrate to discharge the accused on the said solitary ground alone" ?