LATOORI AND OTHERS Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) APPLICANTS were convicted by a Magistrate First Glass Under Section 13 of the Gambling Act and each of them was sentenced to pay Rs. 75/ - as fine. In default of payment or fine they were directed to undergo one month's rigorous imprisonment each. On appeal their conviction and sentence were affirmed by the learned Sessions Judge, Farrukhabad; hence this revision.

(2.) ACCORDING to the prosecution, Applicants were found gambling with kauris in a Juar field by the side of the tube well service road in village Muran and on a search 16 kauris and a sum of Rs. 16.25 n.p. were recovered from the phar. Accordingly they were prosecuted and sentenced as stated above. Learned Counsel for the Applicants has argued that on the prosecution allegation itself Applicants are not liable to punishment Under Section 13 as they were not gambling in any public street within the meaning of that section. It was the private field of a person where the Applicants are alleged to have been playing with the stakes. It has, however, come in evidence that the field was covered by Juar crop of about 3 ft. height. There is no evidence to show that persons sitting inside the field were visible from the tube well service road.

(3.) THE field in question was adjacent to a public street and not separated therefrom by a boundary wall but it was not an open space for the simple reason that it was covered by 3 ft. high Juar crop. That being so, it was not a public place within the meaning of Section 13 and the prosecution and conviction of the Applicants is not sustainable in law.