State of Uttar Pradesh vs Kartar Singh

Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.

Court: Supreme Court of India

Case Number: Criminal Appeal No. 164 of 1962

Decision Date: 06/02/1964

Coram: N. Rajagopala Ayyangar, A.K. Sarkar, K.N. Wanchoo, K.C. Das Gupta

In the matter titled State of Uttar Pradesh versus Kartar Singh, the judgment was delivered on 6 February 1964 by a bench of the Supreme Court of India comprising Justice N. Rajagopala Ayyangar, Justice A. K. Sarkar, Justice K. N. Wanchoo, and Justice K. C. Das Gupta. The opinion was authored by Justice N. Rajagopala Ayyangar. The case is reported in the All India Reporter at 1964 AIR 1135 and in the Supplementary Court Reports at 1964 SCR (6) 679, with subsequent citations including RF 1966 SC 128, F 1971 SC 2346, R 1974 SC 1, R 1974 SC 228, and R 1978 SC 933. The issues addressed involved provisions of the Constitution of India, particularly Article 14, and provisions of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954, namely sections 7, 16(1)(a)(i) and 23, together with the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955, rule 5, and Appendix B A‑11, item 14, relating to the fixation of the Reichert value of ghee for different states of India and the question of whether such fixation was unreasonable or discriminatory.

The respondent, Kartar Singh, was tried for an offence under section 7 read with section 16(1)(a)(i) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 on the ground that he had sold ghee that was alleged to be adulterated. Laboratory analysis of the ghee seized from the respondent showed a Reichert value of only 22.5, while the minimum Reichert value prescribed for the state of Uttar Pradesh, the place where the ghee was sold, was 28. The respondent argued that the ghee had been obtained from Jodhpur, where the fixed Reichert value was 22, and therefore the sample should not be considered adulterated. He relied upon the decision of the Allahabad High Court in State v. Malik Ram, A.I.R. 1962 All 156, which distinguished between ghee derived from cattle raised in hill districts and ghee from cattle raised in the plains, holding that ghee from the hill districts of Uttar Pradesh could not be declared adulterated if its Reichert value matched the standard fixed for Himachal Pradesh, a hilly region. The respondent asserted that his ghee was “pahadi” ghee, i.e., ghee from hill cattle, and thus the Malik Ram precedent should apply. The First Class Magistrate rejected these submissions, convicted the respondent, and imposed a six‑month rigorous imprisonment together with a fine of Rs. 500. On appeal, the Sessions Judge affirmed the findings of the trial court but reduced the period of imprisonment. The respondent then filed a criminal revision petition before the High Court. The High Court agreed with the lower courts that the ghee was not Jodhpur ghee but was produced locally, yet it held that the Reichert values fixed for various states were not based on any reasonable classification. The High Court therefore concluded that it was sufficient for a vendor to meet the minimum standard prescribed for any part of the country; since the minimum standard for certain areas was 21 and the ghee in question had a Reichent value of 22.2, the High Court held that the respondent was not guilty of the offence. The State of Uttar Pradesh subsequently appealed the High Court’s decision to the Supreme Court.

In this appeal, the petitioner argued that the High Court had erred in invalidating or redesigning the regulations issued by the Central Government, alleging that the High Court based its decision on an improper invocation of article 14 of the Constitution and had, in effect, created what it considered to be a reasonable standard. The Court held that where the Government has formulated specific standards after considering a variety of factors, a tribunal may not simply set aside those standards as being unreasonable or discriminatory on the basis of abstract or prior reasoning. Such a determination can be made only when the tribunal relies on concrete material placed before it, typically through scientific analysis. Moreover, any party that relies on article 14 must set out detailed allegations and present evidence to substantiate the claim of unconstitutionality. In the absence of a detailed pleading and supporting evidence, the Court cannot accept a party’s unsubstantiated assertion that a rule is unconstitutional merely because, in the party’s view, the standards are overly stringent and therefore unreasonable. Applying these principles, the Court observed that the earlier decision in State v. Malik Ram (A.I.R. 1962 All. 156) had been incorrectly decided by the Allahabad High Court. In the present case, the High Court had gone further by adopting the lowest Reichert value prescribed for any region in the country and applying it uniformly to all other regions, thereby ignoring the specific rules that applied to each area. Consequently, the High Court was mistaken in permitting the revisions. The judgment proceeds to note the criminal appellate jurisdiction: Criminal Appeal No. 164 of 1962, which challenges the Allahabad High Court’s order dated 2 May 1962 in Criminal Revision No. 1579 of 1961. Counsel for the appellant were O. P. Rana and C. P. Lal, while counsel for the respondent were Harnam Singh Chadda and Harbans Singh. The appeal was heard on 6 February 1964, and the judgment was delivered by Justice Ayyangar. The appeal arose from a certificate of fitness granted by the Allahabad High Court under article 134(1)(c) of the Constitution. It challenged the High Court’s decision to acquit the respondent, Kartar Singh, of an offence punishable under section 7 read with section 16(1)(a)(i) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954 (referred to as the Act). The factual background presented was that the respondent operated a shop at Haldwani where he sold ghee among other items. On 19 March 1960, a Food Inspector purchased a quantity of the respondent’s ghee, placed samples of the purchase into three sealed phials in the presence of the respondent, and recorded in the seizure memo that the ghee was “pahadi ghee.” One of these samples was sent to the Public Analyst of the Government of Uttar Pradesh for analysis to determine whether the ghee was adulterated.

The analysis of the ghee sample revealed that it was sub‑standard, the most significant deficiency being that its Reichert value measured 22.5, whereas the minimum value prescribed for ghee in Uttar Pradesh was 28. After detailing the analytical results, the Public Analyst concluded that the sample contained a small proportion of vegetable fat or oil that was foreign to pure ghee. Following receipt of this report, the Medical Officer of Health in Haldwani authorised the prosecution of the respondent, and the Food Inspector subsequently lodged a complaint before the Magistrate of the First Class. The respondent entered a plea of not guilty and proceeded to present his defence. A second sample of the same ghee was later analysed by the Director of the Central Food Laboratory, who reported a Reichert value of 21.7, slightly lower than the 22.5 reported by the Public Analyst. The Director’s opinion mirrored that of the Public Analyst, stating that the sample was adulterated. The respondent’s defence comprised two principal arguments. First, he asserted that the ghee he sold had been purchased in Jodhpur, and therefore, under the rules framed under the Act, the applicable minimum Reichert value for ghee in the Jodhpur area was 21, a requirement he claimed his sample satisfied. He introduced evidence to substantiate his purchase from Jodhpur, but the learned Magistrate did not accept this argument. Second, the respondent relied on a legal point taken from the decision of the Allahabad High Court in State v. Malik Ram (1). In that case, a Division Bench distinguished ghee obtained from cattle in the hill districts of Uttar Pradesh from ghee obtained from cattle in the plains, holding that despite the general rule prescribing a minimum Reichert value of 28 for the entire State, ghee from hilly regions such as the Kumaun hills would not be considered adulterated if its Reichert value met the standard prescribed for Himachal Pradesh, a predominantly hilly area. Because the Food Inspector had described the respondent’s product as “pahadi ghee,” the respondent sought to rely on this precedent, arguing that his ghee should be judged by the hill‑area standard rather than the statewide standard.

In the course of the trial the Court noted that the earlier decision of the Allahabad High Court held that ghee obtained from hill districts of Uttar Pradesh could be regarded as unadulterated even when its Reichert value was only twenty‑six, provided that the value met the standard applicable to the comparable hilly region of Himachal Pradesh. The Court indicated that it would evaluate the correctness of that decision after completing the factual narrative of the present proceedings. The learned Magistrate, however, concluded that the High Court decision did not apply to the instant case because the Reichert value of the ghee seized from the respondent was found to be below twenty‑six. Accordingly, the Magistrate found the respondent guilty of selling adulterated ghee, imposed a term of rigorous imprisonment for six months, levied a fine of five hundred rupees and ordered that, in the event of non‑payment of the fine, an additional period of three months’ imprisonment would follow. The respondent then appealed to the Sessions Judge at Kumaon, repeating the same pleas and defences that had been raised before the Magistrate. The Sessions Judge accepted the Magistrate’s finding that the respondent had purchased the ghee in Jodhpur and also concurred that the Allahabad High Court decision did not affect the present matter. While affirming the conviction, the Sessions Judge reduced the term of imprisonment from six months to one month and lowered the fine to two hundred rupees. Dissatisfied with that outcome, the respondent filed a criminal revision petition before the High Court under sections 435 and 439 of the Criminal Procedure Code. The High Court judge examined the factual findings and agreed that, based on the record, the ghee in question originated locally, stating, “as the file stands I am satisfied that this ghee was of local origin.” No argument was raised before the High Court concerning the analytical correctness of the earlier decisions. Nevertheless, the High Court judge held that the method by which Reichert values were assigned to different geographical areas across the country lacked a rational classification. He opined that it was sufficient for any vendor of ghee anywhere in India to satisfy the minimum standard prescribed for any area under the relevant rules. Since certain areas of the country were prescribed a minimum Reichert value of twenty‑one, the judge concluded that the respondent could not be deemed guilty of adulteration and consequently ordered his acquittal. The State has now appealed against that acquittal. Before addressing the argument that the standards fixed under the Food Adulteration Act violate Article fourteen of the Constitution, the Court found it necessary to set out the statutory framework governing the present appeal. The preamble of the Food Adulteration Act declares its purpose to be the prevention of food adulteration. Section two of the Act defines an article of food as “adulterated” if, inter alia, its quality or purity falls below the prescribed standard or if any constituent is present in a quantity exceeding the limits prescribed by the Act.

In this Act, Section 3 authorised the Central Government to set up a committee for food standards. The section directed that, as soon as possible after the Act began to operate, the Central Government should constitute a body named the Central Committee for Food Standards. The purpose of that committee was to advise both the Central Government and the State Governments on matters that arose from the administration of the Act and to perform any other functions that the Act assigned to it. Section 3 also laid down the composition of the committee. It required that the Director General of Health Services serve ex officio as the Chairman, and that the Director of the Central Food Laboratory serve ex officio as a member. In addition, the committee was to include two experts nominated by the Central Government, one representative each of the Central Ministries of Food and Agriculture, Commerce and Industry, Railways and Defence, all nominated by the Central Government, one representative nominated by the Government of each State, two representatives nominated by the Central Government to represent the Union Territories, two representatives of Industry and Commerce nominated by the Central Government, and one representative of the medical profession nominated by the Indian Council of Medical Research. Section 7 prohibited any person from manufacturing, storing, selling or distributing adulterated food, either personally or through another person acting on his behalf. Section 8 empowered State Governments to appoint Public Analysts, and Section 9 authorised the appointment of Food Inspectors. Section 13 dealt with the preparation of analysis reports required to determine whether food was adulterated or sub‑standard. Its first sub‑section instructed the Public Analyst to prepare a report, while sub‑section three provided that a certificate issued by the Director of the Central Food Laboratory under sub‑section two would take precedence over the report prepared by the Public Analyst under sub‑section one. Section 16 prescribed the penalties that applied to offences under the Act. Section 23 gave the Central Government the power to make rules, but required that any rule be drafted after consulting the Committee established under Section 3. Among the matters that could be addressed by such rules was the definition of quality standards and the setting of permissible limits of variability for any article of food, as permitted by Section 23(1)(b). The same section also mandated that all rules made by the Central Government be laid before both Houses of Parliament as soon as possible after they were made. Under the authority of Section 23, the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955, were promulgated. Rule 5, which appears in Part III of those rules and is headed “Definitions and Standards of Quality”, stated that the standards of quality for the various articles of food listed in Appendix B to the rules were as defined in that appendix. Ghee was one of the articles of food whose standards were specified in Appendix B, along with milk and milk products.

In the schedule of the rules, the product ghee was listed under head A‑1 and was further described in item 14 of A‑11. The definition given for ghee stated that it was the pure clarified fat obtained exclusively from milk, curds or cream, and that no colouring matter or preservative was to be added to it. The rule then required that ghee conform to specific specifications that varied according to geographic zones. For the zones comprising Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Bhopal, Vindhya Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal except Bishnupur, and PEPSU except Mahendragarh, the specifications included a Reichert value of not less than twenty‑eight, together with other parameters that were omitted in the excerpt. For the zones that included Madras, Andhra, Travancore‑Cochin, Hyderabad, Mysore, Orissa, Assam, Tripura, Manipur, Madhya Bharat, Bombay, Himachal Pradesh, the Mahendragarh district of PEPSU, Madhya Pradesh except the cotton‑tract areas, and Rajasthan except Jodhpur, the same specifications applied except that the Reichert value was required to be not less than twenty‑six point zero. In the zones of Saurashtra, Kutch, the cotton‑tract areas of Madhya Pradesh, the Jodhpur division of Rajasthan and the Bishnupur sub‑division of West Bengal, the Reichert value was required to be not less than twenty‑one and the Butyro refractometer reading at forty degrees Celsius was required to lie between forty‑one point five and forty‑five. The limits for free fatty acids and moisture in these zones were held to be the same as those applicable to the zones of Punjab and PEPSU. The rule also explained that the term “cotton tract” referred to those areas of Madhya Pradesh where cattle were extensively fed cotton seed.

The counsel for the State argued before the Court that the trial judge had acted without authority when he struck down or altered the centrally framed rules by invoking Article fourteen of the Constitution, and that the judge had effectively imposed his own view of a reasonable quality standard to decide whether the ghee sold by the respondent was adulterated. The Court agreed with that submission. The parties accepted that, assuming the rules were valid and the prescribed standards enforceable, the respondent’s ghee would be deemed adulterated and the respondent would consequently be guilty of an offence under section seven read with section sixteen of the Act. The remaining issue was whether any material had been placed before the Court that would justify refusing to apply the rule for determining the quality standards. The Court noted that the standards had been prescribed by the Central Government on the advice of a Committee that included experts in food technology and food analysis. Consequently, the Court held that a rule could be set aside for being unreasonable or discriminatory only on the basis of material, such as scientific analysis, presented before the Court, and not on abstract or a priori reasoning. The Court further stated that a party invoking Article fourteen must plead specific facts and produce evidence to support the claim that the rule was unreasonable or discriminatory, and that a party seeking to challenge the validity of a rule made by a competent authority must do so with detailed averments and convincing proof.

In this case the Court observed that the responsibility under Article 14 lay with the respondent to set out a pleading and to prove any infirmity in the rule, and that this burden was already well settled and required no further explanation. Consequently, if the respondent wished to contest the validity of the rule on the ground that it was unreasonable or discriminatory, he was required to lay a factual foundation for such a challenge by stating the necessary facts and by producing clear and convincing evidence to sustain his claim. The Court explained that a strong presumption existed that all relevant and material factors had been considered when the classification of zones and the corresponding minimum standards for each zone were formulated, particularly because the rule had been drafted with the assistance of a committee of experts created under section three of the Act. This presumption was described as strong, if not overwhelming. The Court added that the respondent could not invoke any fundamental right under Article 19(1) to continue a business involving adulterated foodstuffs. The Court further stated that if the requisite facts were pleaded and established, it would then possess material on which to base a determination of whether the rule was reasonable or discriminatory. However, in the absence of a pleading and proof of unreasonableness or arbitrariness, the Court could not simply accept a party’s assertion that the rule was unreasonable or unconstitutional and refuse to enforce it merely because the party considered the standards to be excessively high. In the present matter there was no pleading or proof of any facts to that effect. The only basis for the allegation of unreasonableness or discrimination was an a priori argument presented to the Court, contending that the division of the country into zones was irrational because hilly and plain areas were not distinguished for the purpose of prescribing the minimum Reichert values. The argument that a distinction should exist between hilly regions and plains relied solely on the different minimum Reichert values prescribed for Himachal Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh and on no other consideration. The Court noted that it was not the case that the whole of Himachal Pradesh was uniformly elevated nor that it contained no plain areas; nevertheless, the fact that the same minimum value was prescribed for the entire state demonstrated that elevation was not the sole factor taken into account. At this stage the Court pointed out that the Reichert or Reichert‑Meissl value test for ghee is an important method for detecting adulteration with certain vegetable oils, because it measures the proportion of volatile soluble acids in the ghee. The presence of an adulterant disrupts the normal ratio between soluble and insoluble acids, as well as between volatile and non‑volatile acids, in pure butter fat or ghee, and the Reichert value of pure ghee reflects this balance.

The Court observed that the Reichert value of ghee is not a fixed figure; it depends on many factors, including the breed of cattle found in an area, whether the cattle are pasture‑fed or stall‑fed, the type of supplementary feed given, the nature of the terrain, the amount of rainfall and other climatic conditions. The Court highlighted that the rules themselves demonstrate the material importance of cattle feed, because they distinguish between different areas of Madhya Pradesh on the basis of the availability of cotton seed for feeding the cattle. According to the Court, the standards set in Appendix ‘B’ were derived from the combined effect of these and other relevant factors, after an extensive survey of samples collected and analysed during various seasons, which led to the division of the country into zones and the prescription of a minimum Reichert value for each zone. The Court clarified that the mere presence of some hilly locations within a zone does not automatically mean that elevation was the sole or decisive factor considered in fixing the standard for that region. Without fully appreciating all the factors that influence the Reichert value of locally produced ghee and the weight assigned to each factor, the Court said it would be impossible to determine whether the classification of areas and the assignment of different standards to them were reasonable or correct. The Court then referred to State v. Malik Ram (1), where a Division Bench of the High Court held that because certain areas of Uttar Pradesh were hilly, the Reichert value prescribed for the hilly areas of Himachal Pradesh should be applied, even though the rules were not ambiguous about the area to which the prescribed standards should apply. The Court noted that, apart from a principle the High Court derived from the rules themselves, there was no material before it showing that the minimum standard prescribed for Uttar Pradesh was defective. The Court criticised the approach in Malik Ram’s case as a reversal of the well‑recognised principle that the burden of proving the invalidity of a statute or rule rests on the party challenging it, and that the opposing party must support the rule with positive evidence of its reasonableness and legality. The Court explained that the High Court inferred from the rules that standards vary with elevation, although it possessed no material to support such a conclusion beyond what it considered to be the rationale for dividing the zones. The Court also pointed out that even within Himachal Pradesh elevation is not uniform and that there are areas of higher and lower elevation, rendering the test adopted by the High Court illogical.

In this case the Court observed that the figures reported in the 1962 All. 156. 134‑159 S.C.‑44 series were higher than those for other areas, and therefore the test that had been applied did not even satisfy logical standards. The Court further expressed that it was not justified for the lower tribunal to effectively legislate by dictating what the statutory rules should be, instead of simply giving effect to the law through strict adherence to the rules as they were framed. In the matter presently before the Court, the learned Judge had gone a step beyond this, by adopting the lowest Reichert value that was prescribed for any part of the country and applying that single value uniformly to every other area, thereby ignoring the differentiated standards set out in the rules. The Court found no justification for such an approach and noted that if the judges in Malik Ram’s case(1) had erred in applying the Himachal Pradesh standard to the hilly districts of Uttar Pradesh, then the judgment now under appeal contained an even greater error. The Court added that even if a party were entitled to disregard the standard prescribed in the rules, as the learned Judge seemed to do, there was no principle supporting the view that a Reichert value below twenty‑one should automatically render ghee adulterated. Consequently, the Court held that the learned Judge was not justified in permitting the respondent’s revision and in acquitting him. As a result, the appeal was allowed, the respondent’s acquittal was set aside and his conviction was restored. The Court was informed that, of the one‑month imprisonment originally imposed by the Magistrate and later altered by the Sessions Judge, the respondent had already served eighteen days and had been on bail for most of the time since his revision petition was admitted in the High Court. In view of these circumstances, the Court considered that the term of imprisonment could be reduced to the period already served, while the fine imposed would remain in force. The appeal was therefore allowed. 1) A.I.R. 1962 All. 156.