BADIROT JAMAL Vs. THE STATE OF ASSAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS revision petition is against the judgment and order passed by the Sessions Judge, Kamrup, Gauhati in Criminal Appeal No. 12 (K -4) of 1975 maintaining the judgment, conviction and sentence passed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Kamrup, Gauhati in Case No. 156 C of 1974 convicting the accused Petitioner under Section 27of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 for violating the provisions of Section 18(C) of the Act and sentenced him to R.I. for one year and fine of Rs. 1,000/ -, in default R.I. for three months. The prosecution case is that accused -Petitioner was Director -cum -Proprietor of M/s. Standard Homeo Laboratory at Dispur and manufactured homeo drugs for sale without obtaining licence under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 for short, the Act. Inspector of Drugs, Rabindra Kumar Barua paid a visit to the premises of the accused and seized as many as 45 varieties of manufactured drugs and materials from the said laboratory under seizure list Ext. 6 and 38. After that the Inspector of Drugs submitted a report Ext.39 against the accused for violation of the provisions of Section 18(c) of the Act. On complaint the Magistrate took cognizance of the offence and in the trial the aforesaid conviction and sentence were passed against him. Thereafter the accused preferred an appeal before the Sessions Judge who upheld the conviction and sentence. Hence this petition.

(2.) SECTION 18 of the Act prohibits manufacture and sale of certain drugs without licence. A provision to this section says that nothing in this section shall apply to the manufacture subject to prescribed conditions of small quantities of any drug for the purpose of examination, test or analysis. Section 27 of the Act is the penal provision.

(3.) THE defence case is that the accused is a research scholar in homeopathic medicine and he is doing research work in homeopathic medicine therefore no licence is required as per provisions of the law in this behalf. It Is the further case of The accused that be kept those medicines or drugs for the purpose of research work. It is also the defence case that the accused has been in connection with the Central Health Department, Government of India in connection with his research work and that he passes his findings of research to the Central Health Department. This is not denied on behalf of the prosecution, Both the learned courts below failed to access the evidence of the accused -Petitioner who put himself In the Witness Box as a defence witness. There is no finding that the evidence of the accused Petitioner is unworthy of acceptance. For all those reasons cited above the prosecution has failed to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt. It is the principle of law that in cases like the present one the evidence on record should be thoroughly scanned and properly appreciated in order to come to the finding of guilt beyond all reasonable doubt. But the same has not been done in the present case by the courts below. As said before I find there is reasonable doubt as regards whether the seized items of medicines were stocked or kept in the premises of the accused Petitioner for sale or for any other commercial purpose.