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The Seeds Act, 1966 (A) Section 19 of the Seeds Act reads as under :

" Penalty - If any person -

(a) contravenes any provision of this Act or any rule made thereunder; or

(b) prevents a Seed Inspector from taking sample under this Act; or

(c) prevents a Seed Inspector from exercising any other power conferred on him by or under this Act, he shall, on conviction, be punishable -

There is no manner of doubt that in the last decade there have been many instances of bogus seeds being spread into the market worth hundreds of crores of rupees and still the punishment provided is fine up to five hundred rupees. A end-user customer of seed being farmer it is he who is directly affected and hence there is urgent need to provide deterrence.

(C) Section 16 of the Seeds Act reads thus :

" Report of Seed Analyst.- (1) The Seed Analyst shall, as soon as may be after the receipt of the sample under sub-

section (2) of section 15, analyse the sample at the State Seed Laboratory and deliver, in such form as may be prescribed, one copy of the report of the result of the analysis to the Seed Inspector and another copy thereof to the person from whom the sample has been taken.

(3) ....

(4) ....

It is seen from reading of Section 16 that after obtaining the report from the Seed Analyst in respect of the sample, the Seed Inspector is supposed to file a prosecution in the court and the accused is then entitled to make application to the Court for sending the sample to the Central Seed Laboratory. No time is mentioned as to within what time from the date of receipt of report of Seed Analyst the accused/complainant is entitled to apply to the Court which, in my opinion, clearly gives scope for manipulation. Sub-section (1) of Section 16 does not provide time within which the Seed Analyst shall furnish his report to the Seed Inspector or the person from whom sample was taken. As against this, Central Seed Laboratory is obliged to send its report to the Court within one month from the date of receipt of sample. It appears that in this Act there is no provision that the Court shall not take cognizance of prosecution being filed by the Seed Inspector without prior sanction of State/Central Government or the Officer authorized in this behalf, which provision is to be found in other enactments, which frustrates the smooth implementation of these enactments.