The Bombay High Court on Friday refused to stay the orders of Maharashtra’s Commissioner of Food Safety and the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), banning nine variants of Nestle India’s instant Maggi noodles from the Indian market for being “hazardous” to public health. Hearing a revision application filed by Nestle India’s revision application seeking the quashing of the State and Central food safety regulators’ orders banning its product from the market, a HC Bench comprising Justices VM Kanade and BP Colabawalla opined that since the product (Maggi) was already off the shelf, no stay on the ban order was required at this stage.
The HC Bench posted the matter for further hearing on June 30. After declining to grant an interim relief to Nestle India ltd, the HC Bench asked the FSSAI and the Maharashtra Government to file their affidavits in reply to the company’s petition within two weeks. The Judges, however, made it clear to the FSSAI that if it wanted to launch prosecution against Nestle India, then it should serve a 72-hour notice to the Indian unit of the Swiss multinational company.
In its plea, Nestle India has urged the HC to quash the New Delhi-based FSSAI’s June 5 order directing the company to withdraw and recall all its nine variants of Maggi from the market on the ground that they were “unsafe” and “hazardous” for human consumption and to stop production, processing, import, distribution and sale of their products with immediate effect.
Nestle India has also urged the court to aside the impugned order of Maharashtra’s Commissioner of Food Safety, banning the production and sale of ‘Maggi’ products of the company in the State. Both the Central and State Food safety regulators had last week directed Nestle India ltd to withdraw the various variants of Maggi instant noodles from the market on the ground that they contained more than the permissible limit of lead in them.
In its revision application, Nestle India has claimed that the impugned orders do not comply with the mandatory provisions of Section 34 of Food Safety and Standards Authority Act which deals with emergency prohibition notices and orders. Its plea said the orders were passed without any authority and without following due process of law. The company has also claimed that the impugned orders are “illegal, arbitrary” and “in violation of” the principles of natural justice as well as the Constitution of India.