RAJENDRA SATYANARAYAN KHANDEL Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN all these petitions, common questions of law and facts arise and therefore they were heard together and are being disposed of by this common judgment.

(2.) IN all these petitions, the petitioners challenge the communications received from the office of the respondent No. 3 requiring the petitioners to have their own laboratory for analysis and testing of the products manufactured by the petitioners. There is also challenge to the Notification issued by the respondent No. 1 on 16/4/1991 under Clause 21-A of the fertiliser (Control) Order, 1985, hereinafter called as "the said Order"; however, in the course of the arguments, the learned Advocates appearing for the petitioners have restriced the arguments to the challenge to the communications, the same being beyond the scope of the provisions of Clause 21-A of the said Order as well as the said Notification dated 16. 04. 1991.

(3.) THE petitioners in these petitions are manufacturers of the products which are admittedly subject to testing in relation to their quality in terms of the provisions of law contained in the said Order which is issued in exercise of the powers conferred by Section 3 of the Essential Commodities act, 1955. The grievance of the petitioners is that though Clause 21-A of the said Order as well as the Notification, dated 16/4/1991 issued in pursuance of the said clause requires the manufacturers to possess minimum laboratory facility, as specified under the said Notification, but the respondent No. 3 is illegally insisting that the petitioners shall own the laboratory for the purpose of testing the quality of the products manufactured by them. It is the case of the petitioners that neither under the said Notification nor under the Clause 21-A of the said Order, it is necessary for the manufacturers to own any such laboratory and the requirement in that regard is that the minimum laboratory facility must be made available by the petitioners for testing the said products and once the manufacturers are able to establish that they possess such facility, the respondent No. 3 could not have threatened to take any coercive measure against the petitioners merely, because the petitioners do nof own such laboratory.