Case: Balkishan Thapar Vs. Municipal Corporation of Delhi

1. This appeal by special leave is directed against the Judgment of the Delhi High Court convicting the appellant under Section 7/16 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act read with Section 2(ix) clause (a) and (g) of the Act and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment of six months and a fine of Rs. 1,000. This order was passed by the High Court in a revision filed by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi against the order of the Trial Court which convicted the appellant under Section 7/15 of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act read with Section 2(ix)(k) of the Act and sentenced him to imprisonment till the rising of the Court and a fine of Rs. 500, a re-vision against this order to the Session Judge was unsuccessful and hence a further revision was taken by the Delhi Administration before the High Court2. The facts of the case are detailed in the Judgment of the High Court and the Magistrate and need not repeat the same all over again. The food Inspectors namely, one Mr. James and Mr. Sinha took samples of a pre-paration called Para Excellent and Para Asli from the shop of the appellant who according to the Food Inspectors sold these preparations as saccharin, a fact which is not admitted by the appellant. The Trial Court after considering the evidence and the report of the Chemical Examiner found that the case of misbranding under Section 2(ix)(a) and (g) was not made out by the Prosecution, but it was certainly mis branding as contemplated by Section 2(ix)(k) of the Act. He, accordingly convicted the appellant as indicated above.

Court's reasoning:
After having examined the label; its description and the contents of the tin and packets, sold to the food inspectors, we are unable to find any evidence of any intention on the part of the appellant to sell a preparation which resembles saccharin in any respect. The words, as sweet as saccharin were merely meant to convey one of the qualities of the preparation itself and not the quality of saccharin at all. That, by itself, would not attract the provision of Section 2(ix)(a) of the Act. It was, then submitted that in one of the labels under the directions it was mentioned that the preparation was para saccharin which also shows that the appellant intended to pass on the preparation as some sort of saccharin. In the first place, the use of the word para saccharin appears to be a mistake in the facts of the present case because this word is completely agent from the Hindi portion of the directions contained in the same label. Secondly, the word para saccharin would not indicate that the preparation sold was saccharin in any form or of any kind. It was just a way of describing it because saccharin being 500 times sweeter than sugar, the manufacturer wanted to convey that the preparation was also much sweeter than sugar and could be used for preparing soda water bottles. It is obvious that if any person who purchased the preparation was not conversant with the English language, he would not be misled at all5. Having regard to these circumstances we are of the opinion that the case of the appellant does not fall within the clauses (a) and (g) of Section 2(ix) of the Act and the High Court erred in law in convicting the appellant for misbranding under these provisions.