GOVERNMENT OF BENGAL Vs. SANTIRAM MONDAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by Government against an order of acquittal passed on the unanimous verdict of a jury on charges under Secs.194, 193 and 211, I.P.C.

(2.) To understand the question of law which has been raised, the facts out of which the appeal arises may be stated as follows. On 5 March 1928, a number of men employed in the Railway workshops at Lilooah under Mr. W.C. Mould, Deputy Chief Mechanical Engineer E.I. Ry., went on strike. On 8 March the workshops were closed down. On 28 March the Agent E.I. Ry. received a deputation of strikers, but-their demands were refused. In the afternoon a large number of strikers proceeded to Bamangachi, between Howrah and Lilooah, and the result of their attitude was that the police were obliged to disperse them by force. Riflle fire was opened and the result is said to have been that one person was killed, one died in hospital and two others were wounded : more, according to the assertion of the accused. After the dispersal, the District Magistrate Mr. G.S. Dutt was informed of the occurrence by Mr. Jones A.S.P., and came to Bamangachi, where he made enquiries and examined Mr. Jones, the accused Santiram Mondal and others. On 2 April, 1928 the accused lodged a complaint before a Magistrate of Howrah charging Mr. Mould and Mr. Jones, together with two other railway officials, Messrs. Withinshaw and Hitchcock, and Major Hewatt, Officer in Charge of the E.I.R. Auxiliary Force, with offences under Secs.147, 148, 149, 302, 304, 325 and 326, I.P.C., that is to say, putting it comprehensively, rioting and murder. The complaint contained the allegation, among others, that after Mr. Sturgis, Mr. Within Shaw, Major Hewett and Mr. Jones had taken over a rifle each from some of the Gurkha guards: Mr. Mould came running from the direction of the loco quarters and snatching off a gun from a Gurkha guard fired it without any previous warning at the strikers. One man was hit and foil down by the side of the road. Then Withinshaw, Hewett and Mr. Jones began firing at random. I saw seven or eight men lying on the ground wounded bleeding and insensible.

(3.) This complaint of Santiram Mandal was taken up by the District Magistrate, and on 9th May 1928 was dismissed by him under Section 203, Criminal P.C., after a judicial enquiry in the course of which Santiram was examined on oath. In the meantime, by 2 April, 1928, the District Magistrate, in the course of his departmental enquiry started on 28 March, had recorded the statements of Captain Christie of the Eastern Frontier Rifles, Mr. Jones, Santiram Mondal, Messrs. Venables, Hannay, Mould, Severs and others.