STATE Vs. CHAND MEAH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE are 11 applications for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court under Article 134(l)(c) of the Constitution. The respective respondents in the various applications were convicted and sentenced under Section 26(l)(h) of the Indian Forest Act in separate criminal cases in the Magistrate's Court and their appeals to the Sessions Judge were dismissed and the convictions and sentences confirmed. In the further revisions they filed to this Court, they were all acquitted by me on the ground that the charges under Section 26(l)(h) cannot be sustained.

(2.) THEY were charged for clearing and breaking up land for cultivation in certain forests which the prosecution claimed to be Reserved Forests under Section 20 of the Indian Forest Act. Three such Forests were involved in the various cases in respect of which three notifications had been issued by the Maharajah of Tripura long before the integration of Tripura into the Indian Union in 1949. The said notifications were issued under Section 5 of what was known as the law relating to the Rakshita Bana Bibhaga (Act No. II of 1297 T. E.) which I shall call as the Tripura Forest Act.

(3.) THE learned Sessions Judge who dealt with the appeals of the respondents did not go into the question under the Part C States Laws Act and see whether the three notifications in respect of the three forests would be notifications issued under Section 20 or Section 29 of the Indian Forest Act. He was of the view relying on Sections 6 and 24 of the General Clauses Act that these notifications can be treated as notifications issued under Section 20 of the Indian Forest Act. He therefore held that the respondents were rightly proceeded against under Section 26 of the Forest Act for offences relating to Reserved Forests.