Page:Acts of the Parliament of India 1954.pdf/74

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Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements)
[act 21

shall take any part in the publication of any advertisement referring to any magic remedy which directly or indirectly claims to be efficacious for any of the purposes specified in section 3.

6. Prohibition of import into, and export from, India of certain advertisements.—No person shall import into, or export from the territories to which this Act extends any document containing an advertisement of the nature referred to in section 3, or section 4, or section 5, and any documents containing any such advertisements shall be deemed to be goods of which the import or export has been prohibited under section 19 of the Sea Customs Act, 1878 (VIII of 1878) and all the provisions of that Act shall have effect accordingly, except that section 183 thereof shall have effect as if for the word shall therein the word 'may were substituted.

7. Penalty.—Whoever contravenes any of the provisions of this Act shall, on conviction, be punishable—

(a) in the case of a first conviction, with imprisonment which may extend to six months, or with fine, or with both;
(b) in the case of subsequent conviction, with imprisonment which may extend to one year, or with fine, or with both.

8. Confiscation of documents, etc., containing advertisements prohibited by this Act.—Any person authorised by the State Government in this behalf may, at any time, seize and detain any document, article or thing which such person has reason to believe contains any advertisement which contravenes any of the provisions of this Act and the court trying such contravention may direct that such document (including all copies thereof), article or thing shall be forfeited to the Government.

9. Offences by companies.—(1) If the person, contravening any of the provisions of this Act is a company, every person who at the time the offence was committed, was in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company as well as the company shall be deemed to be guilty of the contravention and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly:

Provided that nothing contained in this sub-section shall render any such person liable to any punishment provided in this Act if he proves that the offence was committed without his knowledge or that he exercised all due diligence to prevent the commission of such offence.

(2) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section (1) where an offence under this Act has been committed by a company and it is proved that the offence was committed with the consent. or connivance of, or is attributable to any neglect on the part of, any director or manager, secretary or other officer of the company, such director, manager, secretary or other officer of the company shall also be deemed to be guilty of that offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.

Explanation.—For the purposes of this section—

(a) 'company' means any body corporate and includes a firm or other association of individuals, and