CHACKO PYLI Vs. STATE OF KERALA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These Criminal Revision Petitions arise out of prosecutions for offences under S.27 of the Kerala Forest Act, 1961, (Act 4 of 1962) hereinafter referred to as the Act. A common question of law arises in all these petitions and they are therefore disposed of by a common judgment. S.27 of the Act deals with penalties for trespass or damage in Reserved Forests S.4 to 18 of the Act provide for the determination of the rights in the land which is to be constituted as a Reserved Forest. Then comes S.19 under which the Reserved Forest is eventually constituted. S.19 of the Act is in the following terms:

(2.) S.22 of the Act provides that "no right of description shall be acquired in or over a Reserved Forest except under a grant or contract in writing made by or on behalf of the Government or by or on behalf of some person in whom such right or the power to create such right was vested when the notification under S.19 was published or by succession from such person".

(3.) It is a prerequisite for a person to be held guilty under S.27 of the Act that there should be a notification under S.19 duly published in the Gazette. In the absence of such a notification the accused could not be found guilty, for contravention of the provisions of S.27 of the Act.