SRINAGAR: The Food Safety Appellate Tribunal Kashmir has set aside a Rs 3 lakh penalty imposed on a Srinagar-based firm under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, holding that the case suffered from serious evidentiary and procedural deficiencies.
The appeal was filed by M/s Arif Enterprises, Bulbul Bagh Bund near Tengpora Bridge, through its proprietor Arif Bashir Shah, against an order dated August 28, 2025, passed by the Adjudicating Officer, Food Safety and Standards, Srinagar. The order had imposed a penalty of Rs 3 lakh under Section 52 of the FSS Act for alleged misbranding.
Tribunal member Shujat Ali Khan, in a judgment dated September 8, 2026, questioned how the appellant could be held liable for misbranding when, according to the record, he had neither manufactured, stored, sold nor distributed the product that was physically recovered during the enforcement action.
The case originated from a Food Safety Department raid at the premises of Abdul Hamid Kuchay, proprietor of a cold storage facility at Zakura, Srinagar, following a telephonic complaint. Officials recovered 60 packets of meat packed in polythene bags with an outer cardboard covering. The tribunal noted that the packages allegedly lacked the mandatory label particulars prescribed under the Food Safety and Standards (Labelling and Display) Regulations, 2020.
During the investigation, Kuchay reportedly told officials that the consignment had been supplied by Waseem Qureshi for marketing and produced vouchers and bills in support of his statement.
The present appellant was subsequently arrayed as Accused No. 3. According to the case record, Kuchay stated that the quantity originally involved was larger than the 60 packets recovered and alleged that part of the material had been taken away by Shah, allegedly on Qureshi’s instructions, using load carriers.
Shah admitted that he had received and subsequently destroyed the material, but maintained that it was not fit for human consumption. The tribunal observed that the Food Safety Department treated this statement as “unacceptable” and proceeded against him for misbranding.
The tribunal questioned the legal basis for imposing a misbranding penalty where the disputed product was no longer in existence and had not been recovered from the appellant.
It held that misbranding under Section 52 is intrinsically linked to the physical packaging of a food product, including its mandatory declarations and other label particulars. In the tribunal’s view, where the product has neither been seized nor recovered, the physical evidence required to establish misbranding is absent.
The tribunal further observed that Food Safety enforcement procedures require the collection and sealing of samples, their marking and preparation of a label verification report. It held that a penalty for misbranding could not be sustained merely on allegations in the absence of the relevant physical product.
The judgment also criticised the manner in which the adjudication proceedings had been conducted before the Food Safety Adjudicating Officer.
On examination of the record, the tribunal found that no order sheet or minutes of the proceedings had been maintained during the entire adjudication. It said the available record contained notes prepared by supporting staff, on which the Adjudicating Officer had marked “Yes please” on a computerised sheet without his signatures.
The tribunal described the absence of a proper procedural record as a serious lapse, particularly because proceedings before an Adjudicating Officer under Section 68(3) of the FSS Act are deemed to be judicial proceedings and the officer exercises the powers of a civil court.
It held that failure to maintain order sheets, record daily proceedings and document procedural stages deprived the appellate forum of an evidentiary trail through which the legality of the proceedings could be assessed.
A further ground concerned the time granted to the accused to respond to the proceedings.
The tribunal referred to Rule 3.1.1(6) of the Food Safety and Standards Rules, 2011, which requires the Adjudicating Officer to provide an accused at least 30 days from service of notice to make a representation.
In the present case, the complaint was filed before the Adjudicating Officer on August 22, 2025, while the impugned order was passed only six days later, on August 28.
The tribunal held that the appellant was consequently denied the statutory opportunity to prepare a defence, consult counsel and submit a representation. It noted that even the notices appearing on the record raised a separate procedural issue, as they were shown as having been issued on August 1, 2025, 21 days before the complaint was filed.
The tribunal observed that even if the August 1 date were treated as a typographical error and the notices were assumed to have been issued on August 22, the record showed the accused had been directed to appear on August 23, leaving no meaningful opportunity to comply with the mandatory 30-day requirement.
The judgment also took exception to the Adjudicating Officer’s description of the meat as “rotten” and “unsafe” for human consumption.
The tribunal noted that the original complaint concerned alleged misbranding because of deficient labelling. However, while disposing of the matter, the Adjudicating Officer described the material as rotten meat posing a serious threat to public health.
The tribunal held that if the product were indeed considered unsafe food, the matter would fall within the statutory framework governing unsafe food under Section 59 of the FSS Act rather than being dealt with merely as misbranding under Section 52.
It also pointed out that there was no evidence before the Adjudicating Officer establishing that the product was rotten or unsafe, particularly when the material in question had not been seized from the appellant.
Another issue concerned Waseem Qureshi, arrayed as Accused No. 2.
The tribunal found that the Adjudicating Officer had closed proceedings against Qureshi on the ground that his address was unavailable, despite the fact that his full address was reflected in the complaint and was available on the case record.
According to the judgment, there was no indication that summons or notices had first been attempted at the recorded address or that an official postal return had established that the address was incomplete or untraceable.
The tribunal questioned the direction in the impugned order asking the complainant to explore possibilities and provide Qureshi’s full credentials after the case had already been closed and the file consigned to records.
It held that once final proceedings had been concluded and the matter consigned to records, the Adjudicating Officer could not retain jurisdiction to subsequently issue summons unless the law specifically authorised such action.
The tribunal also noted that the prosecution had not challenged the closure of proceedings against Qureshi, despite his address being available in the complaint.
Overall, the tribunal found that the proceedings had been conducted without adequate enquiry and in violation of mandatory procedural safeguards.
It held that the penalty imposed on Arif Enterprises could not be sustained in view of the absence of physical recovery of the alleged misbranded product, failure to maintain proper proceedings records, denial of the statutory 30-day period for representation, and other procedural defects identified in the adjudication.
The tribunal accordingly allowed the appeal and set aside the impugned order imposing the Rs 3 lakh penalty on the appellant.
