1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH : NAGPUR. CRIMINAL APPLICATION NO. 942 OF 2010. RAMDAS DNYANDEVRAO MAHOKAR VS STATE OF MAHARASHTRA ______________________________________________________________________ Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram, appearances, Court's orders Court's or Judge's orders or directions and Registrar's orders. Shri A. S. Mardikar, Advocate for the applicant. Shri C. N. Adgokar, APP for the respondent State. CORAM : A.H. JOSHI, J. DATE : 24th JUNE, 2010. 1. This is an application for anticipatory bail. 2. The applicant has been named as accused in FIR Crime No.3014 of 2010 under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code and under Section 3 & 7 of Essential Commodities Act. 3. It is alleged against the applicant that he has sold seeds titled as B.T. Seeds showing as if those were manufactured by Ajit Seeds. Because of the complaint received from the farmers, the agricultural Officer seized 21 bags of seeds from the complaining farmers, sold to him by the applicant. The seizure has been done in presence of Area Manager Shri Gadhe of Ajit Seeds Company. On inspection of the bags containing seeds which were seized, it had revealed that the product was spurious, and hence the FIR has been lodged by the 2 Agricultural Officer. 4. The bail is pressed on the ground that the offence subject matter is under Section 3 & 7 of the Essential Commodities Act, and is bailable, and therefore, offence under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code is alleged and registered. It is further argued that once Section 3 & 7 of the Essential Commodities Act are attracted, Section 420 of Indian Penal Code does not get attracted. 5. Learned Advocate for the applicant has placed reliance on the following reported judgment:- (1) 2007(2) Crimes 312 (P&H), M/s Bikaner Steel Mills VS. State of Punjab. (2) 1993 CRI L.J. 232, Syed Kaleem, v. M/s Mysore Lakshmi Beedi Works and another. 6. After hearing both sides and perusal of the case diary, what this Court has seen and what prima facie appears is that by selling spurious seeds, offence under Section 420 of the I.P.C., is certainly made out, apart from the offence if any under Section 3 & 7 of the Essential Commodities Act. 7. It is seen from the judgments relied upon by applicant that in so far as the complaint under the Trade and Merchandise Marks Act etc., whenever filed by the person whose rights are infringed, it may not fall under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code, however, if the 3 complaint is filed by a buyer of any product which has deceptive similarity to basic product such buyer, can always claim that he is deceived and offence under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code is committed. The citations relied upon by the learned Advocate will apply to a complainant who claims infringement. These citations, therefore, do not help the applicant. 8. In these premises, this Court is of the considered view that prima facie, what reveals from the contents of the FIR and case diary, at this stage is that, it cannot be believed that the applicant may not be involved in commission of offence subject matter. 9. The offence subject matter is serious. Large number of farmers may have been cheated at the threshold of monsoon & sowing season. The farmers are driven to commit suicide is a matter of judicial notice by this Court. This case can be seen as a tip of ice berg of offenders. 10. The applicant does not deserve any indulgence. 11. Application for anticipatory bail is rejected. Judge //mule//