J SHRAVAN KUMAR Vs. STATE OF A.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short Code) the petitioners herein who are A-1, A-3, A-4 and A-5 in C.C.No.1021 of 2006 on the file of the Court of the XI Metropolitan Magistrate (Mobile Court), Ranga Reddy District (trial court), are seeking quashing of the said case against them.

(2.) The aforesaid case has been instituted by Food Inspector, Division-I, Ranga Reddy District, and the offence alleged against the petitioners is sale of adulterated groundnut oil punishable under Section 2(ia)(m) and Section 7(i) r/w Section 16(1)(a)(i) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 (for short Act). The 1st petitioner/A-1 is said to be the vendor of the groundnut oil. The complaint reads that the sample was lifted on 07.07.2004. The public analyst report of the State Food Laboratory (SFL) is dated 10.08.2004. That report shows that the sample did not conform to the standard of beliers test (turbidity temperature - acetic acid method) and is therefore adulterated. It is stated that the complaint was filed on 26.06.2006 in the trial court.

(3.) The plea of the petitioners is that there is a delay of more than about 1 year 10 months in filing a complaint or launching prosecution from the date of analyst report and nearly 2 years from the date of lifting samples and therefore the petitioners have lost their valuable right of getting the second sample of groundnut oil analysed by the Central Food Laboratory (CFL) and consequently the case should be quashed. It may be noted here that according to Section 13 of the Act the report of the CFL analyst supersedes the report of the SFL analyst and if the report of the former shows that there is no adulteration, the prosecution cannot be launched. In view of this legal position, Sri Adesh Varma the learned counsel for petitioners relying upon the above delay factor contended that because of the above delay in launching the prosecution the second sample has become unfit for analysis by the CFL and consequently the case should be quashed as the petitioners were denied the valuable opportunity of getting the second sample analysed by the CFL as contemplated under Section 13(2) of the Act.