A division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice A V Mohta was hearing a petition filed by Dhariwal challenging the seizure of its consignment at Nhava Sheva port by the Customs.
According to the petition, in November last year the Food Safety Commissioner had issued a letter to the Commissioner of Customs directing that export or import of gutkha and pan masala should not be allowed from any port of the city.
The letter was issued pursuant to a ban imposed on sale, manufacture and storage of gutkha and pan masala by the state government vide a notification dated July 19, 2012 under the Food Safety and Standards Act (FSSA).
"Soon after the letter was issued by the food and safety commissioner, the petitioner's consignment worth Rs 2.5 crore reached the Nhava Sheva port in Mumbai from the manufacturing plant in Vadodara for export. This consignment has been seized," petitioner's counsel Milind Sathe argued.
Sathe said that the government notification did not impose a ban on export of tobacco products from Maharashtra.
Advocate General Darius Khambata, however, argued that irrespective of whether export is prohibited under the notification, the Food Safety Regulations empowers the commissioner to prohibit export or import of any food product considered to be dangerous for consumption.
"We also apprehend leakage of the tobacco products in the state during export," Khambata said.
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The bench then asked the government to state tomorrow if it was willing to release the consignment so that the petitioner could take it back to Gujarat and export it from there.
The court added that the release of the consignment would be subject to an undertaking to be given by the petitioner that in future it would export its products from Gujarat itself.