STATE OF MAHARASHTRA Vs. VISHRAM AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by the State under Sec. 378 of the Code of Criminal Procedure against the order passed by the Judicial Magistrate, First Class, Hinganghat in Criminal Case No. 1054 of 1975 on 31st March 1981, acquitting respondents, accused Nos. 1 and 2, of the offence punishable under Sec. 7 (i) read with Sec. 2(i)(c) punishable under Sec. 16 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954.

(2.) The acquittal was mainly on five grounds : (i) the Food Inspector, complainant Shrikrishna (P.W. 1) was not shown to have been empowered by a proper notification under Sec. 9 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act ('the Act" for short) for initiating the prosecution ; (ii) Mandatory provisions of Rule 14 under the Act were not complied with inasmuch as the bottles in which the sample of groundnut oil were taken, were not cleaned properly ; (iii) no independent witness as required under Sec. 10(7) o f the Act was examined. One of the two panch witnesses, P,W. 3 Mohammed Harun had turned hostile while the other witness P.W. 2 Prahlad was a Food Inspector himself being a departmental witness. Number of customers were present at the time when the samples were collected but no efforts were made to requisition the services of a real independent witness from out of them ; (iv) the evidence of P.W. 2 Prahlad being interested witness being from the same department, had a little corroborative value as he was a witness from the department ; (v) The report of Public Analyst at Ex. 22 did not show that the samples collected were found to contain articles injurious to public health.

(3.) Samples of edible oil in three bottles were collected on 4-8-1975 at Hinganghat by P.W. 1 Shrikrishna, Food Inspector. A complaint was filed on 18-12-1975. The complainant himself was examined after a delay of 4 1/2 years, on 12-8-1980. The record shows that most of the time he was represented by the A.P.P. and was not present personally.