STATE OF RAJASTHAN Vs. NETI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE facts of this appeal are, that Food Inspector R.B. Singh of circle Kalindari. District Sirchi filed a complaint under Section 16 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 in the court, of the Magistrate First Class Sirohi that on 7 -5 -68 at 6.10 A.M. be went to village Rampura and purchased buffalo milk from the accused Neti who was selling buffalo, milk. He divided the milk into three parties and placed it into three separate phials; one phial was delivered to the accused, another was sent to the public analyst and the third was kept by him. The public analyst, Jodhpur, reported that the sample milk contained fat 4.5% amd solid non fat 8.1% and therefore, was adulterated because it did net conform to the prescribed standards of purity. The said food inspector requested the Magistrate for trial.

(2.) AFTER trial the Sub -Divisional Magistrate Sirohi, acquired the Accused on the ground that the food Inspector had. not complied with ,the various rules. The contravention is said to have been taken place on .account of the fact that the sample, was not taken in, the presence of independent witnesses. The two witnesses of the purchase, made by the food Inspector, did not belong to village Rampura but were residents of Kalindari and one of them was a vaccinator and the other a ceon, both being employees of the Medical and Health Department Second fault found in the proceedings of the, said Inspector was, that there was no evidence corroborating the sealing and labelling of the there divided samples. No sample bottle was provided in the court to enable it to prove the sample examined. The food Inspector further violated Rule 17 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955 by, not sending the covering memo with the sample so that the public analyst could compare the seals, and Rule 18 was violated by not pending, a copy of the similar memo by post. It also appears that the first phial which was sent by the Public Analyst was broken, but there is no record to show that the Public, Analyst was sent the second phial for examination. In view of these contraventions of the provisions of the rules, the It learned Magistrate considered the case of the prosecution doubtful and dismissed the complaint and acquitted the accessed by his judgment dated 29 5.1970. Hence this appeal by the State.

(3.) I have considered over the matter. There is no provision which says that the food inspector while purchasing the milk or any other article will do so in the presence of two motbirs and whose too of the same locality What Section 10, Sub -section (7) of the Act requires is that the food inspector shall call one or more persons to be present at the time when any sample is taken and take his or their signatures. In this respect therefore the evidence of the food inspector is not only sufficient but is supported by the evidence of Bhanwarlal. Their testimony cannot be rejected because they belonged in the same department of the Government. Babulal v. State of Gujrat : 1971CriLJ1075 may be referred to for support of this view.