New Delhi: The Maharashtra government Friday moved the Bombay High Court against the Centre and the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), opening up a larger legal battle over a basic question: How far can FSSAI exercise licensing and enforcement powers over centrally licensed food businesses operating within Maharashtra without encroaching on the powers of the state’s food safety authorities?
In a writ petition, the state of Maharashtra, through Food Safety Commissioner Tukaram Mundhe, has accused the FSSAI of creating what it calls a parallel central licensing and enforcement mechanism under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006.
The litigation comes amid a wider food-safety enforcement drive in Maharashtra under Mundhe. Published accounts of the litigation have noted that the case comes against the backdrop of action by Maharashtra’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) against eateries and other establishments over alleged food safety violations.
Among other things, Maharashtra has challenged changes made to the food-business licensing rules in March 2026. An amendment notified on 10 March altered the framework for deciding whether a food business would require registration, a state licence or a central licence. Three days later, the FSSAI issued an order fixing the revised turnover limits under that framework. Under the 13 March order, businesses with an annual turnover above Rs 1.5 crore and up to Rs 50 crore require a state licence, while those with turnover above Rs 50 crore require a central licence. Maharashtra has asked the high court to strike down both the March amendment and the order.
The case also throws up a political irony: the BJP-led Maharashtra government has gone to court accusing a regulator under the BJP-led Centre of encroaching on the state’s powers. They may come from the same political family, but in the Bombay High Court, the fight is over where the Centre’s food safety authority ends and Maharashtra’s begins.
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What is Maharashtra’s case against FSSAI?
Maharashtra’s case is that the Act envisaged enforcement primarily through state commissioners of food safety and officers functioning under them, rather than through a separate set of central authorities exercising similar functions.
The argument goes back to the origins of the 2006 law. Maharashtra relies on the Statement of Objects and Reasons of the Food Safety and Standards Bill, 2005, to argue that the legislation was designed to decentralise food regulation. According to the state, enforcement was intended to be carried out through state commissioners, their officers and panchayati raj and municipal bodies, while licensing functions administered by central agencies under earlier food laws were also intended to be decentralised.
The problem, Maharashtra argues, lies in what happened subsequently. The state has challenged provisions of the Food Safety and Standards (Licensing and Registration of Food Businesses) Regulations, 2011, that recognise a “central licensing authority” comprising a designated officer appointed by the FSSAI’s chief executive officer (CEO) acting in the capacity of food safety commissioner.
The regulations also provide for businesses to fall under either central or state licensing arrangements, depending on the applicable criteria. Maharashtra has also objected to the FSSAI’s use of Section 10(5) of the Act, which allows its CEO to exercise the powers of a commissioner of food safety in specified food-safety matters.
Maharashtra contends that the CEO of FSSAI cannot, by invoking Section 10(5) of the Act, exercise powers that the state says belong to its commissioner of food safety. The state argues that the provision cannot be stretched to create a parallel central licensing and enforcement machinery.
It has consequently challenged appointments and provisions relating to central licensing authorities and central food safety officers. In essence, Maharashtra is asking whether regulations made under the Act can create a central enforcement machinery which, according to the state, the parent legislation itself did not envisage.
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Taking on FSSAI’s regulatory framework
The practical consequences of that dispute become much clearer in an FSSAI order dated 12 May 2023, which Maharashtra has now asked the Bombay High Court to strike down. The order provides that regular inspections, including complaint-based inspections, of food businesses holding central licences are to be conducted by central food safety officers. State-designated officers and food safety officers, it says, can assist when asked to do so.
The order does not completely prevent state authorities from acting against centrally licensed establishments. Instead, it provides for state intervention only in specified circumstances, including food safety incidents or emergencies requiring immediate action.
Maharashtra contends that the arrangement restricts the powers of its own commissioner of food safety and state officers, and has asked the high court to stay the order and allow them to enforce the Act against businesses holding central licences and registrations.
As part of interim relief, the state also wants centrally appointed licensing and food safety authorities restrained from carrying out the disputed functions, and central licences to be treated as state-issued licences for enforcement purposes.
Therefore, the state is not simply arguing that its officers must be allowed to enter and inspect centrally licensed premises. It wants its commissioner and officers to be able to enforce the Act against such businesses, rather than operate within an arrangement in which significant enforcement responsibilities ultimately rest with central authorities.
Maharashtra’s challenge also extends to FoSCoS, the online platform through which food-business licences and registrations are managed. The state wants the data maintained on the platform transferred to authorities appointed by its food safety commissioner and has also sought the creation of a separate state platform for licensing and registration in Maharashtra.
The state’s broader argument is that if the FSSAI does not have the statutory authority to create the parallel central licensing and enforcement machinery in the manner alleged, it cannot use subordinate regulations and executive orders to enlarge that machinery.
(Edited by Sunanda Ranjan)
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