BANSI RAM RAUNIAR Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an application for bail. It appears from the first information report lodged in the case that the offence which the petitioner is alleged to have committed is a contravention of Government notification No. 32676, dated 11-12-1951, published in the Bihar Gazette, dated 12-12-1951. The petitioner is said to have carried 125 maunds of rice on a lorry from Purulia to Hazaribagh, and this was prohibited by the said notification. The following passage from the first information report may be quoted:

(2.) THE petitioner moved an application for bail before Mr. S. C. Prasad, Vacation Judge in the judgeship of Manbhum Singhbhum, and the learned Judge, by his order dated 23-9-1952, released the petitioner on an ad interim bail. It appears to have been argued before him that Section 13A, Essential Supplies (Temporary Powers) Act was applicable to the facts of this case; but that argument was rejected. When the matter came to be heard finally, it was heard by Mr. Anant Singh, who was then the Vacation Judge in that judgeship, and he, by his order dated 14-10-1952, cancelled the ad interim bail granted to the petitioner, holding that Section 13A of the Act was applicable to the facts of this case.

(3.) IN the case before me, there is no indication in the first information report that the operation of the proviso to Sub-section (2) of Section 7 can be made to apply. IN these circumstances, I am unable to hold that Section 13A, Essential Supplies (Temporary Powers) Act should, be made applicable to the facts of this case. That being so, the question now remains whether there are sufficient grounds for releasing the petitioner on bail. As I have stated in the earlier pan; of this judgment, when the petitioner had first applied in the Court below before Mr. S. C. Prasad for bail, the learned Judge had given reasons for allowing him to be released on ad interim bail. J see no reason now to hold that that order was erroneous.