(1) The Municipal Commissioner or Chief Officer or any person authorised by the municipal council in this behalf, may at any reasonable time, enter into and inspect any market, building, shop, stall or place used for the storage or sale of articles of food or drink or used for the slaughter of animals, and examine any article of food or drink or any animal which may be kept therein, and if any article of food or drink or any animal therein appears to be intended for human consumption and to be unfit therefor, he may seize the same.

(2) If the owner or person in whose possession such article or animals is found, consents, thereto, the Municipal Commissioner or Chief Officer or the authorised person may destroy it or dispose of it so as to prevent its being exposed for sale or used for human consumption.

(3) If such article is of a perishable nature, it may be disposed of in themanner specified in sub-section (2) without the consent of the person in possession.

(4) No article of food or drink shall be exposed for sale without properand hygienic protection.

(5) In cases not falling under sub-sections (2) and (3) the article, or animalseized as aforesaid shall be removed forthwith and placed before a magistrate of the first class for orders under sub-section (6).

(6) If any animal or article is brought before a magistrate under sub-section (5), the magistrate, on its being proved that the article or animal is intended for human consumption and is unfit therefor, may order the article or animal to be destroyed or to be so disposed of as to prevent its being exposed for sale or used for human consumption to be dealt with, as he may think fit, and may direct that the owner or person in possession of such article or animal shall be punished with fine which may extend to one hundred rupees:

Provided that a person who is in possession of any article or animal as a carrier or bailee thereof, in ignorance of its nature shall not be liable to fine under this section:

Provided further that when any article of food or drink referred to in this sub-section appears to the magistrate not to be what it is represented to be, solely by reason of the fact that there has been added to it some substance not injurious to health, no offence shall be deemed to have been committed by the owner of the article or the person in whose possession the same is found, if such owner or person proves to the satisfaction of the magistrate, --

(a) that such substance has been added to the article of food or drink, because the same is required for the production or preparation thereof, as an article of commerce, in a state fit for carriage or consumption and not fraudulently to increase the bulk, weight or measure of the food or of drink or conceal the inferior quality thereof; or

(b) that in the process of production, preparation or conveyance of such article of food or drink the extraneous substance has unavoidably come to be intermixed therewith; or

(c) that, by a label distinctly and legibly written or printed on or with the said article of food or drink or by other means of public description, he

has given sufficient notice that such substance has been so added; or

(d) that, --

(i) the said article was purchased by him with a written warranty that it was of a certain nature, substance and quality,

(ii) he had no reason to believe that it was not of such nature, substance, and quality as aforesaid, and

(iii) it was not exposed, hawked about, or brought for sale by him otherwise than as an article of the nature, substance and quality specified in the written warranty, and was in the same state in which he purchased it.

(7) It will be open to a municipal council, to set apart any stall or specifiedlocality for the sale of butter or ghee and in such stall or specified locality no butter or ghee shall be sold or exposed for sale that is adulterated with any other substance.

(8) Whoever sells or exposes for sale adulterated butter or ghee in anystall or locality to set apart shall be punished with fine which may extend to one hundred rupees and the magistrate may cause such ghee to be destroyed or to be so disposed of as to prevent its being exposed for sale in such stall or locality.

(9) In all prosecutions under this section the magistrate shall refuse toissue a summons for the attendance of any person accused of any offence against its provisions unless the summons is applied for within a reasonable time from the alleged date of the offence of which such person is accused.