PARBHU Vs. KING-EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) AT the conclusion of the arguments in this case on January 26, 1944, their Lordships announced that they would humbly advise His Majesty that the appeal be dismissed. They now state their reasons for this advice.

(2.) ON August 15, 1942, the Sessions Judge of Rohtak in British India found the appellant guilty on a charge of murdering his uncle Nanhu. The appellant was sentenced to death and on appeal to the High Court of Lahore the 'conviction and the sentence were confirmed. ON a petition to His Majesty in Council special leave to appeal in forma pauperis was granted to the appellant.

(3.) THE contention of the appellant was that his arrest, having been effected in Jind territory by a British Indian officer, was illegal and that the illegality of his arrest vitiated the whole subsequent proceedings. THEir Lordships reject this contention. THEy assume that the arrest was open to objection as an infringement of the sovereignty of Jind, although the Jind authorities, so far from resenting what had been done or regarding their rights as having been flouted, co-operated most readily with the British Indian Police in bringing the appellant to justice. THEre was no suggestion of anything like kidnapping. In their Lordships' view the validity of the trial and conviction of the appellant was not affected by any irregularity in his arrest. "When the appellant was presented for trial at Rohtak, he had been validly surrendered to the Court there by the Jind authorities, and so far as that Court was concerned,, everything was regular and in order.