RAMESHWAR LAL DAROLIA Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Cases under Rule 81(4), Defence of India Rules, are pending against the petitioners in the Court of a Magistrate at Monghyr. These rules have been issued on applications of petitioners for quashing the proceedings, or, in the alternative, for transferring the cases to any district other than Monghyr.

(2.) In application No. 295 the petitioner Ramkishun Das is the proprietor of a Lakhisarai firm known as Badridas Jainarain, Agents of the Caltex Oil Co., at Lakhisarai. The petitioner Rameshwar Lal Darolia is the manager of the said firm. In application No. 296 the petitioner Basant Lal Singhania is the ex-Secretary of the Local Price Advisory Committee (Economic Advisory Council), Lakhisarai. The cases pending against them are on allegations made by the servant of a Barbigha firm, Messrs. Dhaniram Madanmohan, licensed dealers in kerosene oil, to the effect that the agents declined to give them their monthly quota of kerosene oil because they did not agree to pay Rs. 20 per tin extra over the controlled rates, and secondly, that they kept incorrect accounts by entering oil supplied, in one register in November, and in another register in December, so as to make it appear that one delivery of oil was really two. The petitioner Basant Lal Singhania is accused of abetting these offences by writing certain letters which it is said were not bona fide and showed that the Secretary was in league with the firm and connived at profiteering.

(3.) I do not wish to enter any further into the facts, because there is the danger that anything I might say, no matter how carefully worded, might tend to prejudice the trials one way or the other. It is enough to mention that allegations of fact have been made; and out of the several officers who enquired into them, some have reported unfavourably to the petitioners. It is, therefore, proper that these allegations should be put to the test in a regular trial. In the case of the proprietor of the firm and the manager, no real ground has been put forward for quashing the proceedings.