STATE OF MAHARASHTRA Vs. LAXMI CHAND SUNDERDAS PAMNANI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal is capable of being decided on the short point that the reasonable and mandatory requirement of Section 10(7) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 was let by the Complainant - Inspector to the winds. This is one of the grounds on which the learned Magistrate has passed an order of acquittal in favour of the respondent/accused and I find it impossible to find any fault with the order.

(2.) The facts are very simple: Two Food Inspectors marched to the shop of the respondent/accused which is a Provision Store. One of them, Shri Mulla, has filed the present complaint and hence, he will be referred to her in after as the complainant. The Complainant picked out a container of Supari which, according to the Complainant was being sold by the accused in the shop. He purchased 600 gms. of Supari from the shop for Rs. 12/- in the presence of so-called independent witness Rajni Tulsidas Durgadas (P.W. 2); divided the same into three equal parts and those three portions in plastic bags, which according to the Complainant were clean, and sent one of them to the Chemical Analyser observing, allegedly, all the requirement of law relating to the sample sent to the Chemical Analyser so also relating to the other two samples. The case of the prosecution is that as per the Report received from the Chemical Analyser, the food product sent to the Chemical Analyser for analysis was adulterated within the meaning of the Act. Hence, after observing the legal formalities, the present complaint was filed by the Complainant alleging commission of offence by the accused under Section 7(i) and (v) read with section 2(ia)( j) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 and rules framed thereunder, punishable under Section 16 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act.

(3.) A charge was framed by the learned Magistrate against the accused under the Sections mentioned above. The prosecution led evidence thereafter of two witnesses, the present Complainant Mulla (P.W. 1) and the so-called independent panch witness Rajni Tulsidas Durgadas (P.W. 2). The Complainant no doubt stated that he had observed the various legal formalities and has so taken independent panch witness with him at the time when he set out for taking the sample from the shop of the accused. He mentioned the name of P.W. 2 Rajni Tulsidas Durgadas to be the independent witness whom he had taken with him. But P.W. 2 Rajni Tulsi Das, who is just a student, stated at the very outset in his Examination-in-Chief that he was not present when the samples were taken. He further stated that he was called from out side and was forced to sign some documents. He further stated that he signed those document because he was told that it was the government work. He even went to the extent of stating that he did know as to which shop those documents pertain to. The witness was not declared hostile. All the same, the learned Magistrate gave liberty to the learned Asst. Public Prosecutor to cross examine the witness. But except making suggestion to him that the real state of facts was something different from what he had stated in his Examination-in-Chief, nothing was brought out from his cross-examination by the Asstt. Public Prosecutor to show that he was not a witness of truth or that he was won over by the accused. This being the position, the learned Magistrates took the view that there was no evidence beyond the bare word of the Complainant Inspector to show that the mandatory requirement enjoyed by the Act to be complied with before sending the samples of food article to be the Chemical Analyser were complied with by the Inspector. He held that this requirement was of a mandatory character and non-compliance with the same vitiated the investigation and the prosecution.