Jun 11, 2014

Notification for tribunals under FSA issued

ALLAHABAD: The state government has issued a notification in compliance of the order of the Allahabad High Court for the establishment of appellate tribunals and also presiding officers and as required under the Food Safety and Standards Act (FSA), 2006.
Consequently, parties accused of violation of the Act and aggrieved by the imposition of penalty or other adverse order under the Act, can now approach the aforesaid tribunals to avail of their right to statutory appeal, and this will ease the pressure on the writ jurisdiction of the HighCourt.
Earlier, a division bench of this court had disposed of a bunch of writ petitions which had been filed challenging the orders passed by the additional district magistrate/adjudicating officers under Section-68 of the Food Safety and Standard Act, 2006 (hereinafter referred to as the Act, 2006) for violation of the provisions of the Act, 2006.
While disposing of the petitions, the court had observed that the Act, 2006 provides for an appeal against the order made under Section-68 of the Act. However, since appellate tribunals had not been constituted, the aggrieved party, namely the petitioners, had no other option but to approach the High Court under the writ jurisdiction (Article-226) of the Constitution. The High Court, while entertaining the present writ petition, granted an interim order in favour of the petitioner on certain conditions including deposit of part of the penalty imposed.
At one stage, on behalf of the state, government advocate Akhilesh Singh, assisted by Neeraj Kanta Verma, additional government advocate, had informed the Court that eight (08) AppellateTribunals under Section-70 of the Food Safety and Standard Act, 2006 had been constituted along with their territorial jurisdiction and that presiding officers of the appellate tribunal were to be appointed in consultation with the Chief Justice of the Allahabad High Court.
The matter in that regard was placed before the Chief Justice, who referred the same to the Administrative Committee of the High Court, Allahabad. The Administrative Committee as per its resolution dated April 7, 2014, had resolved that eight district & sessions judges, as mentioned in the resolution, shall be the presiding officers of the Food Safety Appellate Tribunal as per their jurisdiction from the date of the issuance of the notification by the state government for the purpose.
The ministerial act of issuance of notification for complete establishment of the tribunal and the appointment of its presiding officers was awaited and the court directed the state government to issue necessary notification for establishment of the appellate tribunals along with the presiding officers as per the decision of the High Court.
In compliance of the aforesaid order, the state government issued a notification (dated May 23, 2014) appointing seven district and sessions judges to function as presiding officers of the Food Safety and Standards Act Appellate Tribunals, as per the specified jurisdictions, with immediate effect.

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