STATE OF BIHAR Vs. SITARAM SAHU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by the State Government against the acquittal of the two respondents after trial on charges under Clauses (a) and (b) of Section 27 of the Drugs Act (23 of 1940) for stocking and exhibiting for sale certain misbranded drugs in contravention of Section 18 (a) (ii) of the Act and for doing so without license in contravention of Section 18 (c) of the Act read with Rules 59 (2) and 61 (i) of the Drugs Rules. The offences are said to have been committed on the 27th October 1961 at a Kirana shop of the respondents situated in mahalla Baribazar of Hazaribagh town.

(2.) The prosecution case is that on the aforesaid date Shyam Sunder Prasad (P. W. 3), the Inspector of Drugs, visited the shop of the respondents and found Anocin, Anacin, Bedna Santi Ras and Raj Bedna Santi Ras being exhibited there for sale. He also found a photograph of Ram and Sita with the cartoon of Amogin exhibited in the shop. He seized the aforesaid articles along with a cash memo of a firm known as Jai Janta and Company with head office at Patna. The seizure was made in the presence of some witnesses, one of whom was Ajit Kumar Sarkar (P.W. 1) and the seizure list (Ext. 3) was prepared in form No. 16 prescribed by Rule 55 of the Drugs Rules, A copy of the seizure list was also handed over to the respondents and one of them Mahabir Sahu endorsed his signature on the seizure list (Ext. 3). Thereafter on enquiry from the Director of Health Services, who is the Chief licensing officer for the purposes of the Drugs Act, it transpired that Jai Janta and Company of Patna was not a licensed manufacturer of drugs in the State of Bihar. From the Civil Surgeon of Hazaribagh, who is the licensing the respondents held no license for selling drugs, authority of his district, it was ascertained that The Drugs Inspector thereupon submitted a prosecution report and the present prosecution was started.

(3.) The respondents denied that any drug had been seized from their shop or that they had stocked or exhibited for sale any drug in contravention of the law.