THE HON’BLE SRI JUSTICE GOPALA KRISHNA TAMADA CRIMINAL REVISION CASE No.206 of 2011 ORDER: On credible information, respondents herein inspected M/s Sri Ratnalamma Thalli Oils, Essar petrol bunk of Muthanaveedu village of Pedavegi mandal, belonging to the petitioners herein, on 15.06.2006 and found them doing clandestine business by not maintaining prescribed registers and thereby contravened the provisions of Clause 2(P), 2(F) & 2 (6) of the MS & HSD Order, 2005 and Clauses 12 (2) and conditions 3 (3), 6 (1), 9 and 11 of the Form-B licence issued under the A.P.Petroleum Products (L&RS) Order, 1980, read with Section 6-A of the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 (for brevity, ‘the Act’), resulting in occurrence of certain irregularities in the stock. Since no proper explanation was offered by the petitioners, the stock was seized and the matter was reported to the Joint Collector for initiation of necessary proceedings. Pursuant to the said reference, the proceedings under Section 6-A of the Act has been initiated and the petitioners were served with notices calling for their explanation. The Joint Collector, Eluru, after holding an enquiry, rejected the contentions put forth by the petitioners, and found that the petitioners contravened the provisions of Clause 2(P), 2(F) & 2 (6) of the MS & HSD Order, 2005 and Clauses 12 (2) and conditions 3 (3), 6 (1), 9 and 11 of the Form-B licence issued under the A.P.Petroleum Products (L&RS) Order, 1980, read with Section 6-A of the Act and accordingly, by order, dated 16.12.2009, ordered confiscation of 100% of the value of the seized stock. The said order, dated 16.12.2009, was questioned by filing an appeal in E.C.C.M.A.No.88 of 2009 under Section 6-C of the Act. By judgment, dated 10.11.2010, the learned Principal District Judge, Eluru, while holding that the finding arrived at by the Collector was correct, however, reduced the confiscation from 100% to 50% and directed the respondents to release 50% of the seized stock and if it is sold or not available the value thereof be refunded to the appellants. The said judgment is challenged in this revision. 2. Heard learned counsel for the petitioners. 3. Learned counsel for the petitioners contends that the Court below failed to note that M/s Essar Oils Limited was granted licence by the Government of India to deal with the petroleum products and to issue dealership, and the Indian Oil Corporation, which is a Central Government undertaking, supplied M.S. and H.S.D. to the petitioners and the products offered for sale are upto specification and the Government of A.P. also issued Form-B licence to the petitioners and also explosive licence to offer the petroleum products for sale and the petitioners offered only petroleum products supplied by the Indian Oil Corporation, and hence the question of indulging in any clandestine business by the petitioners herein does not arise. 4. Having considered the submissions and on perusal of the relevant material available on record, this Court is of the view that for the irregularities in the stock, the petitioners could not offer proper explanation. In fact, the authorities below not being satisfied with the explanation offered by the petitioners for the irregularities in the stock, ordered confiscation. I see no merits in this revision. However, as the Court below has taken a lenient view and reduced the confiscation to 50%, this Court is of the view that further lenience should be shown and, accordingly, the confiscation is reduced to 25%. 5. With the above modification, the Criminal Revision Case is disposed of. _______________________________ GOPALA KRISHNA TAMADA,J 18th February, 2011. Tsy