EMPEROR Vs. DATTATRAYA LAXMAN SARPOTDAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner asks this Court to hold as ultra vires the proclamation of the District Magistrate of Ratnagiri, prohibiting the dissemination in the said District of pictures or symbols of Bal Gangadhar Tilak. The main ground of objection to the legal validity of the proclamation is that in terms it prohibits the circulation of the book in question throughout the District of Ratnagiri and -not in any particular town or village, or neighbourhood thereof. It is urged that s 42 of the Bombay District Police Act (No. IV of 1890) gives no power to the District Magistrate to issue a proclamation so as to make it apply to the District in general.

(2.) The section is not clearly worded but I think that the preliminary conditions essential under its provisions for the exercise of the jurisdiction conferred by it are these : first, the jurisdiction is conferred on the Magistrate of the District or in his absence and subject to his own order the Magistrate of the First Class; secondly, these must have jurisdiction in the town or village where the jurisdiction is intended to operate; thirdly, they must be present in such town or village or in the neighbourhood thereof at the time the jurisdiction under the section is set in motion. There is no evidence in the present case that at the time the proclamation complained of as illegal was issued the District Magistrate was either in the place or the neighbourhood of the place where the petitioner is alleged to have disobeyed the terms of that proclamation. The proclamation was issued by the District Magistrate from Dapoli where he then was.

(3.) The section we are construing is of a penal character and must be strictly construed as it affects the liberty of the subject. The intention of the Legislature appears to have been that such a proclamation as is contemplated by the section should be issued in such a manner as to give full publicity to its terms on the responsibility of the District Magistrate or Magistrate of the First Class, who must be personally in the place to satisfy himself that there is necessity for the proclamation.