- (1.) Leave granted.
(2.) One Seethapathy (Accused No.1), since absconding, President of M/s Chandra Importers Inc., New York (for the sake of brevity, hereinafter referred to as, "the Company"), was indulging in illegal internet pharmacy business. It has a branch at Coimbatore. Appellant herein (Accused No.2) was managing the activities of the said branch. A search was made in the office of the accused and various documents and computers were seized. It is alleged that the appellant used to mail consolidated requirements by means of packing slips in the name of individual customers to the e-mail I.D. of the first accused. The first accused used to procure different drugs indicated by the appellant by the local pharmacy and pack separately as per packing slips and dispatch the same to the customers abroad through airmail and RMS post office at Coimbatore. The drugs procured and exported are Alprazolam, Lorazepam, Nitrazepam, etc. Indisputably, these drugs find place at Serial Nos. 30, 56 and 64 respectively of the Schedule appended to the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 (for short, "the Act")
(3.) Inter alia, on the premise that for export of the said drugs no permission from the Competent Authority was obtained, the appellant and his co-accused was prosecuted under Section 8(c) read with Section 22, 23, 25, 27A, 53, 53A and 58 of the Act. Primarily, relying on or on the basis of a decision of this Court in State of Uttaranchal v. Rajesh Kumar Gupta, 2007 1 SCC 355, it was urged that the appellant and his co-accused might have committed an offence under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 but not under the Act or the Rules framed thereunder. The learned Special Judge as also the High court, however, disagreeing with the said contention of the appellant herein rejected his application for bail.;