CASE NUMBER
Writ Petition (L) No. 1688 of 2015
BENCH
Justice V.M. Kanade and Justice B.P. Colabawalla
CITATIONS
2015 SCC ONLINE BOM 8526. 2015 RCR CIVIL 5 156
DECIDED ON
12 June 2015
RELEVANT ACT/ SECTION
Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006.
BRIEF FACTS
The company was a subsidiary of the Swiss company NESTLE and was engaged in the manufacturing of food goods. For the past 30 years, the Petitioner had been manufacturing and marketing MAGGI, a food product. Certain samples of food goods that were being marketed were examined sometime in May of 2015, first in Utter Pradesh and then in Calcutta when the Petitioner filed an appeal.
ISSUES BEFORE THE COURT
The order dated 05/06/2015 issued by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, as well as the order dated 06/06/2015 issued by the Commissioner of Food Safety, State of Maharashtra, are being challenged by the petitioner. The petitioner raised contention against respondent’s claim that the products were not standardized and had misleading information.
RATIO OF THE CASE
The judges said that since the products were being removed from the market and were no longer being marketed, it was not recommended that the procedure for cancelling the production approval that had already been prolonged until the next hearing date. The contested orders were issued without a formal notice of show cause. It was also argued that the abovementioned order was issued by officials that lacked the authority to issue such orders. However, the respondents argued that they had the liberty of taking immediate action against the company in case of any emergency in the form of threat to public, health, etc.
DECISION OF THE COURT
The topic of granting a stay to the impugned orders did not arise at that time because the Petitioner had stated that the Petitioner – Company had already decided to remove its product from the market despite their statement that the product was safe for human consumption. Respondents, on the other hand, were free to take any legal action they saw fit against the Petitioner if they believed the aforementioned statement had not been followed. They will do so after giving the Petitioner 72 hours’ notice. If the Maggi product is discovered with shops or others, they had the right to take it.
This case analysis is authored by Vanshika Samir, a first-year student at the Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law, Patiala, Punjab.
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