HYDERABAD STATE Vs. BEERAPPA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BEERAPPA and seven others were charged, before the Mag. of Cheetapur, under Sections 124 and 267. Hyderabad Penal Code for rioting with deadly weapons and voluntarily causing hurt to one Devappa to compel him to give their shares in the house and mother landed property.

(2.) IT was argued before the Mag. , on behalf of the accused that Section 267 could not apply to the facts of the present case as disclosed by the indictment because the word 'property' occurring in the section charged did not cover immovable property. For this proposition reliance was placed on Ammeeruddin v. Sarkar-e-Aali, 27 Deccan L. R. 5. It is laid down there that the word 'property' read in the context of the definition of extortion given in Section 319, Hyderabad Penal Code, connotes the attribute of movability so as to be capable of being handed over or delivered.

(3.) THE learned Mag. did not decide the objection and as the offence under Section 267 was exclusively triable by a Ct. of Session he committed the case to the Addl. Ses. J. at Bidar, leaving the objection to be decided by the latter Ct. This was obviously wrong and consequently when the question was raised by the accused persons before the learned Addl J he rightly felt himsglf bound by the interpretation put by a D. B. of this H. C. on the word' 'property' occurring in Sections 267 and 319 in the ruling referred to above. He, therefore, made a reference to the H. C. with the recommendation that the commitment be quashed. When the reference came up before the D. B. the learned Judges differed from the view taken in Ammeeruddin v. Sarkar-e-Ali, 27 Deccan L. R. 5 and have referred the case to the F. B.