Mumbai, Jul 27 The Bombay High Court has granted an interim stay on the Food and Drug Administration's decision to suspend the licenses of a few milk suppliers and vendors in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, noting the due process of law was not followed.
The Aurangabad bench said the due process mandated improvement notices and a hearing opportunity before taking the drastic action.
A single bench of Justice S G Chapalgaonkar passed the orders over the last week in separate petitions filed by the aggrieved milk vendors and suppliers.
The FDA had suspended the licenses of the petitioners earlier this month for alleged violation of the Food Safety Guidelines.
The petitioners claimed that there were only minor deficiencies. As per the provisions of law, an improvement notice ought to have been issued before initiating a drastic decision to suspend the licence.
The bench said that in most cases, the deficiencies noted by the FDA during inspections were not of a serious nature that would require closure of milk processing units or abrupt suspension of licenses.
The high court issued notice to the FDA and granted an interim stay on its decision to suspend petitioners' licenses.
"This Court, prima facie, finds that action under impugned order is 'dehors' (beyond the scope of) the requisite procedure under Section 32 of Food Safety and Standards (which mandates an improvement notice)," the bench said.
Petitioners' advocate Rahul Karpe had argued that a show-cause notice or opportunity of hearing should have been given first.
The government contended that the FDA officer has the power to suspend the license without any notice.
The bench, however, noted it found no exigencies were available by which such drastic action could have been taken without issuing an improvement notice or without providing an opportunity of hearing to the petitioners.
