BHUTNATH KHAWAS Vs. DASRATHI DAS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Bhutnath Khawas, the petitioner, as Forest Officer of the Dhalbhum estate, lodged an information of theft with the police against one Dasarathi Das for outting away a mohul tree from a plot in Mauza Narsinghgarh belonging to the estate.

(2.) The trying Magistrate held that the case was totally false, malicious and vexatious, and acquitted the accused and ordered the Forest Officer (so I understand) to pay compensation to him. After moving the Sessions Judge in revision unsuccessfully Bhutnath applied to this Court, not so much against the acquittal of Dasarathi Das as for expunging certain observations made by the trying Magistrate in his judgment against Bankim Chandra Chakravarty, the manager of the estate who had been examined as a witness for the prosecution. At the hearing a question arose whether an application of this kind could be entertained at the instance of Bhutnath and upon this Bankim Chandra Chakravarty himself put in an application praying that the observations objected to may be expunged. Sir Sultan Ahmad who appeared for Bhutnath, and afterwards for Bankim Chandra as well, made it quite clear from the very beginning that his grievance was not the acquittal of Dasarathi Das this Court does not as a rule interfere in revision with acquittals but the observations of the Magistrate against Bankim Chandra.

(3.) The question whether an application of this kind can be entertained at the instance of Bankim Chandra Chakyavarty himself, when the Court is not dealing with the orders passed in the case, does not appear to have been decided in this Court, but has been the subject of some difference of opinion in other High Courts. My attention has been drawn to Criminal Reference No. 45 of 1936 decided by Khaja Mohammad Noor J. on 14 August 1936, as an instance in which this Court ordered certain remarks to be expunged from the judgment of a Magistrate. That, however, was a case of remarks not against a witness but against an Advocate, and the question how far the High Court has power to order such remarks to be expunged was neither raised nor discussed.