ORDER

17.03.2017 Heard the learned counsel for the petitioner State and the learned counsel for the opposite party.

2. The petitioner-State has challenged in this writ petition an order of the learned District Judge, Cuttack passed in F.A.O. No. 15 of 2008 setting aside an order of confiscation passed by the Licensing Officer-cum-Divisional Forest Officer, Athgarh in O.R. Case No. 20C of 2001-02 under the Orissa Saw Mills and Saw Pits (Control) Act, 1991 (for short “the Act”) on the ground that the opposite party having not running a saw mill/saw pit, the confiscation proceeding initiated against the seized woods and implements for violation of Section 13(2) of the Act by the licensing authority was without jurisdiction, so also vitiated for noncompliance of the mandatory provisions of the enquiry under Rule-4 of the Orissa Forest (Detection, Enquiry and Disposal of Forest Offences) Rule, 1980 (hereinafter referred to as “the Rules”) before prosecution launched as held in the case of Rabi Narayan Sahu –Vrs. – Range Officer of Sorada Range and Others, 2008 (II) OLR 592.

3. It appears form the record that Forest staff of Cuttack Range Divisional Mobile Party and Police personnel raided the carpentry shop of the opposite party wherefrom huge quantity of furniture and sawn sizes were seized and thereafter a prosecution was lodged by the Licensing Officer under the Act indicating therein that the opposite party was running a saw pit without license inasmuch as he was carrying on sawing operations inside the premises and confiscated the stock seized. An appeal being carried out against the aforesaid order before the learned District Judge, Cuttack by the petitioner, the learned District Judge, Cuttack rendered finding as aforesaid and quashed the prosecution overruling the objection of the counsel for the State that the appeal before the District Judge was not maintainable on the ground that the carpentry unit of the opposite party is not coming under the purview of the Act and also the statutory mandate for conducting the enquiry by a Range Officer has not been made by the Range Officer as held in the case of Rabi Narayan Sahu (supra), and others.

4. The aforesaid order has been assailed in this writ petition, on the ground that the order of the District Judge, Cuttack is illegal and arbitrary and liable to be set-aside inasmuch as when the opposite party was having a carpentry business and operating the saw pit without license, his stock has been rightly confiscated by the Licensing Officer. Against the aforesaid order, an appeal being maintainable before the Conservator of Forests which was not done and the opposite party directly approached the Court of the District Judge, Cuttack the learned District Judge, Cuttack should not have entertained the appeal of the opposite party and passed the impugned order, hence such order of the learned District Judge, Cuttack cannot be sustained.

5. It is also submitted by the learned counsel for the petitioner-State that the impugned order being contrary to the facts and law, the same cannot be sustained. The evidence on record discloses the opposite party was running a saw pit by doing sawing operation though in a carpentry shop, wherefrom some furniture and wooden sizes were seized along with the saw. The District Judge as such could not have held that the opposite party’s carpentry shop is not covered under the Act and as such confiscation order passed by the authority under the Act is unsustainable. The act complained of being squarely covered under the Act, the impugned order was bad. The confiscation order has been quashed on the ground of non-compliance of the statutory mandate of conducting the enquiry by the Range Officer under the Rules placing reliance on the decision of this Court in the case Rabi Narayan Sahu (supra) which is no more the good law in view of the decision of the Full Bench rendered in case of Anatha Bandhu Mandal Vs. State of Odisha reported in 2015 (II) OLR