SHC puts Sindh Food Authority DG on notice over contempt plea

The Sindh High Court (SHC) has recently issued notices to the Sindh Food Authority (SFA) director general and SFA South deputy director on a contempt-of-court application filed against them by private restaurants owners.

The restaurants owners had submitted in the application that the SHC had on July 19, 2022 restrained the food authority from taking any coercive action against them in pursuant of the Section 17(1)(C) of the Sindh Food Authority Act 2016 that authorised food safety officers for raiding a workplace and sealing its premises.

They submitted that the Supreme Court had already nullified the powers of the food authority officers for sealing and raiding the premises of restaurants in Punjab and following such principle laid down by the apex court, the Section 17(1)(C) of the SFA law could be also declared unlawful.

A counsel for the plaintiffs submitted that SFA officials in order to bypass the restraining order of the court had resorted to other illegal tactics to take coercive action against them. He submitted that some SFA officers were conducting raids on the plaintiffs’ restaurants and business premises without any notices and harassing the owners and operators of the restaurants forcing them to pay money for no reason. The counsel maintained that in case of non-payment, the officers had been imposing heavy fines on the plaintiffs or creating hurdles for their businesses.

He submitted that such illegal actions had started in the last holy month of Ramazan and food authority officials were issuing challans to the plaintiffs without justifying the reasons.

The counsel submitted that the plaintiffs had challenged the vires of the Sindh Food Authority Act 2016 with regard to powers of food safety officers for conducting raids at the restaurants and sealing the premises and failure of the government from framing rules and regulations under the law.

He submitted that the SFA and its officers had been violating the court order and issuing unwarranted challans against the plaintiffs and there was no standard against which the imposition of penalty could be determined.

He submitted that the action of food authority officers for issuance of unwarranted challans to restaurants owners was amount to defiance of the the court order that restricted them from taking any coercive action against the plaintiffs’ restaurants.

The SHC was requested to restrain the alleged contemnors from violating the court orders and take action in accordance with the law for defiance of the court orders. The high court after hearing the arguments of the counsel issued notices to the SFA DG and SFA South deputy director, and called their comments on the next hearing. The SHC also issued notices to the Sindh advocate general and other respondents to file their comments in the case.