The right to reanalyze seeds under Section 16(2) of the Seeds Act is statutory and must be exercised within the shelf-life; failure to do so results in the complaint being time-barred and prejudicial to the accused.

JUDGMENT :

1. By way of preferring present application under Section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1972, the applicants have invoked extra ordinary jurisdiction of this Court for quashing and setting aside the criminal complaint being Criminal Case No.756/2008 pending before the court of the learned Judicial Magistrate, First Class, Upleta for the offences under Sections 6 and 7 of the Seeds Act, 1966 (hereinafter referred to as “Act, 1966” for short) and under Rule 10 of the Seeds Rules, 1968.

2. Heard learned advocate, Mr. A.I. Surti for the applicants and learned APP Mr. L.B. Dabhi for the respondents.

3. The brief facts leading to the filing of the present application are as under,

3.1 The applicant no.1 is the owner of the shop and retail distributor of the product viz., Hybrid Bajra seeds variety “Swaminath- 2001”, whereas the applicant no.2 is the owner and manufacture of the said product and the respondent no.1 is the Agriculture Officer, Upleta.

3.2 On the fateful day, the respondent no.1 took sample of Hybrid Bajra seeds variety “Swaminath-2001” bearing Lot No.55-01-09- 212503 from the premises of the applicant no.1 for its analysis and sent it to Seed Testing Laboratory at Junagadh and in pursuance thereto, on 19.07.2006, the respondent no.1 received report from the said laboratory to the effect that the sample of Hybrid Bajra seeds variety “Swaminath-2001” was found to be sub-standard quality, therefore on the strength of the said report, the impugned complaint came to be filed before the competent criminal court for the alleged.

3.3 On filing of the complaint, the concerned Magistrate took cognizance and issued process upon the applicants, however for the reasons best known, the summons could not be served, which led to issuance of warrant upon the applicants, which was eventually served and in pursuance thereto, the applicants appeared before the court through their advocate.

3.4 As soon as the applicants appeared before the court on 26.02.2014, on the very same day, they have submitted an application under Section 16(2) of the Act, 1966 for the purpose of sending the sample to Central Food Testing Laboratory at Varansi for reanalysis.

3.5 The aforesaid application preferred by the applicants was opposed by the State by filing written statement. Thereafter after hearing the parties, the learned Judicial Magistrate, First Class, Upleta rejected the said application by an order dated 02.09.2014. Therefore, the present application is preferred for quashment of the impugned complaint.

4. Learned advocate submitted that sample of Hybrid Bajra seeds variety “Swaminath-2001” was taken by the respondent no.1, which was sent to Seed Testing Laboratory at Junagadh for its analysis and on receipt of the report dated 19.07.2006 from the said laboratory, it was found out that the sample collected by the respondent no.1 was found to be sub-standard quality, therefore on the strength of the said report, the impugned complaint came to be filed before the competent criminal court for the alleged offences, wherein the learned Magistrate took cognizance and issued process, however initially the applicants could not be served and, hence, non-bailable warrant was issued, which was eventually executed and in pursuance thereto, the applicants appeared before the concerned court and immediately thereafter on the very dame day i.e. on 26.02.2014, they submitted an application under Section 16(2) of the Act, 1966 for the purpose of sending the sample to Central Food Testing Laboratory at Varansi for reanalysis, which is the mandatory requirement, however, the said application was rejected by the concerned Magistrate and, thereafter, the present quashing petition has been preferred before this Court.

5. Learned advocate submitted that in fact, at the time of submission of application, it was stated in a very categorical terms that in all circumstances, the applicants desire to exercise their valuable rights for sending the sample for reanalysi