KRISHNAPADA GHORUI Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE point urged before the Courts below and re-interested before us is that the prosecution under Section 16 of the prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954, is vitiated because of non-compliance with or violation of the provisions of Rule 9a of the Rules framed under the act. Rule 9a, as it stood at the material time, provided that "the Local (Health) Authority shall immediately after the institution of the prosecution forward a copy of the report of the result of analysis. . . to the person from whom the sample of article was taken by the Food Inspector The report in this case was sent 5 days after the institution of prosecution. We have no double that the same could not amount to non-compliance with the Rule or at least such non-compliance as would vitiate the prosecution.

(2.) WE must import a little bit of common sense in construing laws and legal instruments. Laws being made by and for human beings cannot be expected to require the doing of something which is humanl impossible. Lexnon cogit ad impossibilia. The Local (Health) Authority, the Food Inspector and the Court are three different entities at three different places and,, notwithstanding all reasonable expedition by all concerned, the Local (Health) Authority may not be able to know about the institution of the prosecution in the Court by the food Inspector before a couple of days or more after such institution. Therefore, the expression "immediately", which lexically may mean 'at once' also, cannot be taken to bear that meaning in Rule 9a; all that it can reasonably mean is 'as early as possible' or "without unreasonable and avoidable delay'. If the time-gap between the initiation of the prosecution by the Food Inspector and the forwarding of the report by the Local (Health) Authority is reasonable, the report must bee held to have been forwarded without delay and. therefore, 'immediately' within the meaning of Rule 9a.

(3.) IN Rule 9a, as it now tands after the Amendment in 1984 the words "within ten days" have been substituted for the word "immediately". Whether the Amendment, having been made subsequently, would apply to this case ex priprio vigore is a different. matter. But the Amendment, in our view, clearly indicates that according to the Law-making authority also, a period of ten days may reasonable be required for forwarding the report of analysis by the Local (Health) Authority after coming to know about the institution of the prosecution by the Food Inspector. And as already stated, if the report has been forwarded after such time as is reasonably required therefore, the same must be taken to have been without delay and. therefore, immediately.