N.L. Ganguly

1. This petition under section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure by the petitioners seeking a direction for quashing pro- ceedings arising out of the charge-sheet dated 18-8-1989 under section 3/7 of the Essential Commodities Act in Case No. 2 of 1990. State v. Rajendra Chandra Jain pending in the court of (the Special Judge, Varanasi. The facts of the case in brief are that there is a firm, namely, Shri Vishnu Concrete Products Pvt. Ltd., Ram Nagar, Varanasi, who are engaged in manufacturing of prestressed cement concrete poles supplied by them to the State Electricity Board. The applicants were issued am authorisation letter by the State for supply of 890 metric tonne cement (from the Orient Cement, Devpura in Andhra Pradesh. It is stated that some investigation was conducted by the Sales Tax authorities combined with the supply office inspectors. In pursuance of the inspection one FIR was lodged under section 3/7 of the Essential Commodities Act. In the said FIR it was stated that the petitioners after obtaining the supply of cement on the basis of the allotment letter issued by the Government, obtained the said cement and sold it to others on retail wit