SATISH KUMAR Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BASING the complaint Annexure P-2 on the report of Public Analyst Annexure P-1 that the sample of 'Namkin' taken by him from the petitioner on May 24, 1986, was coloured with blue basic coaltar dye and, therefore adulterated, the petitioner was prosecuted by Shri. S. L. Anand, Food Inspector, in the Court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Rohtak. Cr. Misc. No. 618-M of 1988 has been filed by the petitioner for quashing the complaint and the criminal proceedings taken therein by the learned trial Court on the grounds, (i) that 'Namkin' is not included in Appendix B of Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955, and there is thus no standard prescribed in the rules for it; (ii) that the name of the unpermitted blue basic coaltar dye having not been disclosed in the report Annexure P-1, the charge against the petitioner is wholly groundless; and (iii) that the proceedings against the petitioner before the learned trial Court are obviously an abuse of the process of the Court.

(2.) IN reply it was conceded that 'Namkin' was not included in Appendix 'B' of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955, and therefore its was not prescribed therein. It was, however, asserted that charge against the petitioner could neither be termed groundless nor an abuse of the process of the Court because the sample of 'Namkin' taken from him had unpermitted blue basic coaltar dye therein and was termed as adulterated by the Public Analyst on that score.

(3.) ARTICLE of food 'Namkin' sample whereof was obtained by the Food, Inspector from the petitioner being admittedly not included in Appendix 'B' of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955, there is obviously no standard prescribed therein to judge its purity. Besides it was held in Ravinder Kumar v. The State of Haryana, 1986(II) Prevention of Food Adulteration Cases 158, "Thus, the paper chromatography would reveal that there is present food colouring on coaltar dye. Bat on that test to conclude that it was permitted or non-permitted is rather begging the question. No other data is available on the Public Analyst's report as to how he has come to the conclusion that the coaltar dye was non-permitted. It has already been noticed that Rule 28 permits use of coaltar dye. The public analyst should have excluded in his opinion the possibility of all the five permitted coaltar dyes pertaining to red colour. As is plain, no such effort was made. Thus, the reports of the Public Analyst cannot be taken as a gospel truth and outweigh normal judicial balancing if the courts were to blindly follow the report of the Public Analyst, then to my mind it would be in the nature of abdication of judicial functions. It is to be borne in mind that a Public Analyst is just an expert and his opinion evidence sought normally be clear and unambiguous so that it is understandable, if not be all, at least to a sizeable section of the people who are non-experts. The accused was acquitted in that case. The above observations are clearly applicable to the present case. The Public Analyst has not given any other data in support of his opinion except the paper chromatography test. Accordingly, the present petition succeeds.