PUTTU LAL Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS revision arises out of the Judgment dated March 10, 1978, passed by the IV Additional Sessions Judge, Agra, dismissing the appeal that was filed by the present applicant against his conviction and sentence under Section 7 read with Sec­tion 16 of the Prevention of Food Adul­teration Act.

(2.) ON October 10, 1975, at about 9.30 a.m. the Food Inspector, Bah, found the applicant carrying about 35 litres of buffalo milk in a can. The Food Ins­pector collected milk out of that can. One part of the sample was sent to the Public Analyst, who reported it to be adulterated. A complaint was, there­fore, filed for the prosecution of the ap­plicant. During his examination in the trial court the applicant accepted that on the date and time alleged the Food Inspector collected sample out of the milk in his possession. He, however, pleaded that he did not receive any price for the same and further that the milk was not intended for sale but was being taken by him to his uncle Subedar in connection with Thirteenth Day cere­mony of some deceased relation at his place.

(3.) LEARNED counsel for the applicant, it appears, took pains in preparing this case and addressed very elaborate argu­ments covering almost every possible point in the case. It was first; contend­ed that the sanction in the instant case was invalid as it did not appear from it that the sanctioning authority applied its mind to the facts of the case before recording the sanction. A number of cases were cited by the learned counsel for the applicant in order to contend that an authority according sanction for prosecution of any offence should do so only after applying its minds to the re­levant facts. It is needless to refer to all those decisions because so far as the legal proposition enunciated by the learned counsel is concerned, there can be no two opinions about it. The ques­tion, however, is whether it is open to the applicant to raise such a contention for the first time in revision and, if so, whether it can be held in the instant case that the sanction was accorded by the authority concerned without apply­ing his mind to the facts of this case.