KAUSHAILIYA Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These six criminal revision applications from Kanpur involve identical questions of law and may conveniently be dealt with together. Proceedings have been launched against all the six applicants under Section 20 of the Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls Act 1956, on the ground that they are prostitutes and that in the interests of the general public they should be asked to remove themselves from the places where they are at present residing. Objections have been filed at the initial stage of the proceedings in the Court of the City Magistrate of Kanpur, before whom the cases are pending, claiming that the proceedings are not legally maintainable and should be dropped; but the learned Magistrate has repelled this argument and the applicants have accordingly been obliged to approach this Court.

(2.) The contention of the applicants is twofold : firstly that the Magistrate is not entitled to take action against them under Section 20 Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls Act on the basis of reports submitted by a Sub-Inspector of Police who has not been appointed under Section 13 of the Act as a 'special police officer', with power to deal with offences under the Act; and secondly that Section 20 of the Act is unconstitutional since it infringes Article 14 and Clauses (d), (e) and (g) of Article 19 of the Constitution.

(3.) As regards the first point, reliance is placed on the decision in Delhi Administration v. Ram Singh, 1961 All LJ 805 : (AIR 1962 SC 63), in which the Supreme Court approved the view taken by a Delhi Magistrate that he could not take cognizance of an offence under Section 8 of the Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls Act on the basis of a charge-sheet submitted by a Sub-Inspector who bad not been appointed as a special police officer under Section 13. My attention has also been drawn to the ruling of the Madras High Court in Re Kuppammal, AIR 1959 Mad 389, where it was held that a Magistrate could not take cognisance of offences under Sections 3, 4 and 6 of the Act because the investigation in that case had been conducted by an Inspector of Police who had not been appointed under Section 13 as a special police officer "for dealing with offences under this Act". It seems to me, however, that reports under Section 20 of the Act stand on quite a different footing from charge-sheets under Sections 3, 4, 6 or 8. A. report under Section 20 does not relate to any offence, but is merely an information to the Magistrate that a certain woman or girl residing in or frequenting some place within the local limits of his jurisdiction is a prostitute, whom it is desirable to remove in the interests of the general public. Special police officers are appointed under Section 13 of the Act for the purpose of "dealing with offences"; and that is why it has been held that they alone can submit charge-sheets regarding offences alleged to have been committed under various sections of the Act. But making a report under Section 20 cannot be constraed as "dealing with offences under the Act"; and there would appear to be no reason why an ordinary sub-inspector, who has not been appointed as a special police officer under Section 13, should not be competent to make such a report. Indeed the wording of Section 20 is wide enough to permit a Magistrate to act on the basis of information received from a person who is not a police officer at all. There is thus no force in the applicants' first contention.