EMPEROR Vs. RUSTAM KARANJIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal by Government against the order of the Chief Presidency Magistrate of Bombay acquitting the editor and publisher of a weekly newspaper in Bombay called "Blitz" of the offence under Section 27B of the Bombay Children Act (Bom. XIII of 1924).

(2.) One Dr. Talati was arrested on March 31, 1944, for ill-treating his daughter named Zarine, and charged for causing hurt to her, under Section 324 of the Indian Penal Code read with Section 9 of the Bombay Children Act. He was therefore placed before the Magistrate for remand on April 15, 1944. But before that date, a report was published in the newspaper "Blitz" on April 8, purporting to be from the woman editor of that paper. In that report certain facts were stated, the substance of which was that one girl named Zarine, exactly five years of age, winsome, frail and sickly, the daughter of a Parsi medical practitioner, whose age was somewhere in the forties, was cruelly ill-treated by her father, and was lying in the ward of the Jerbai Wadia Hospital. Thereafter, the father, Dr. Talati, gave a notice to the editor of "Blitz" through his advocate that he contemplated taking proceedings against the paper for publishing the report. On April 29 the notice given by the advocate was published verbatim in the paper with a note from the editor to the effect that the notice was the outcome of a report published in "Blitz" about the charge against Dr. Talati, a medical practitioner, for mercilessly beating his five years old daughter, that the editor knew his business, and was perfectly aware of the legal implications of the case, and refused to be intimidated by such gratuitous warnings.

(3.) In June, 1944, the Public Prosecutor filed a complaint against the editor of the "Blitz" under Section 27B of the Bombay Children Act, which runs thus: No report in any newspapers or news-sheet of any offence by or against a child or of any proceedings in any Court relating to such offence shall disclose the name, address or school, or include any particulars calculated to lead to the identification of any such child nor shall any picture be published as being or including a picture of any such child.