SITA RAM Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an application in revision which was made under the following circumstances. The applicant was ordered by a Magistrate of the first class to give security to keep the peace under Section 107 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. He presented a petition to the District Magistrate asking him to exercise his powers under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The Magistrate, without hearing the applicant or his Pleader, made an order in the following words: "There is no appeal to me from Section 107 of the Code of Criminal Procedure orders. Application is made, however, under Section 125. The lower Court has found certain allegations made against the applicants to be true. These allegations justify action under Section 107 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. I decline, therefore, to take action under Section 125 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The application is rejected." The present application is against the order just quoted, and it is contended that the District Magistrate should not have disposed of the application without hearing the applicant or his Pleader. It is quite unnecessary for us to decide whether or not it was actually illegal for the learned District Magistrate to make his order without hearing the applicant or a Pleader on his behalf, At the same time we think that it clearly was open to the applicant to ask the District Magistrate to exercise his powers under Section 125 to cancel the bond and that as a general practice either the applicant or his Pleader should be heard before the application is rejected. Reading the matters mentioned in the petition that was made to the District Magistrate, it is quite clear that the application was in reality an appeal from the order of the Magistrate of the 1st class directing the applicant to permit security. Section 125 provides that the District Magistrate may at any time, for sufficient reasons to be recorded in writing, cancel any bond for keeping the peace or for good behaviour executed under the chapter therein referred to. An appeal is expressly allowed by the Code against an order of the Magistrate directing a party to give security for good behaviour. No such appeal is given against an order directing security to be given to keep the peace. It seems to us, therefore, that it could not possibly be the intention of the Legislature to give what would be nothing short of a right of appeal under Section 125 when it refrained from expressly doing so, as it did in the case of security for good behaviour The order of the District Magistrate rejecting the application Was in our opinion, right. There was no allegation that there had been any change in the circumstances between the time that the Magistrate made his order and the application to the District Magistrate. The only thing that can be said against the District Magistrate s order is that it was made without giving the applicant or his Pleader an opportunity of being heard. If the view which we have just expressed be correct, we think that applications for revision made to the High Court in respect of orders to give security to keep the peace ought not to be rejected solely on the ground that the applicant has not first made an application to the District Magistrate. The High Court is the only Court which can interfere in revision in a matter like this. We reject the present application to this Court, but in doing so our order is to be without prejudice to any application in revision to this Court from the first order directing security to be given to keep the peace or to any further application which the applicant may be advised to make to the District Magistrate under Section 125. We reject the present application.