EMPEROR Vs. PUNJA GUNI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present matter has been referred to us by the Sessions Judge of Kanara in the following circumstances.

(2.) A subject of the State of Junaghad in Kathiawar was arrested in Bombay and accused of committing a serious offence on a ship belonging to a Junaghad subject on the high seas some eighteen miles or thereabouts from the coast of the Kanara District. Having been arrested in Bombay the accused was taken to Karwar. He was placed before the First Class Magistrate there and on the point being raised that Magistrate held that he had jurisdiction to enquire into the case. The Sessions Judge, however, doubted whether these proceedings were founded on any jurisdiction and has submitted the case to us for our orders.

(3.) If we find that the Kanara Courts have not jurisdiction, we shall have so to express our opinion and leave it to the Magistrate to discharge the accused. It cannot be doubted that some Court somewhere has jurisdiction to try this offence. And seeing that the accused is a subject of the Junaghad State and that the ship on which the alleged offence is said to have been Committed belongs to a subject of that State and has not been registered as a British ship, we thought it proper to give notice to the Junaghad State. Mr. Taraporevalla has appeared as counsel to represent the State and has put before us an interesting argument. But though, as I have said, there must be jurisdiction somewhere to try this offence, what we have to consider is whether the Courts of the Kanara District have such jurisdiction. The case is certainly not provided for either by the Code of Criminal Procedure or the Indian Penal Code. The offence, if any, committed, is not territorially an offence under the Indian Penal Code, nor is it an offence which is made triable by any of the provisions of the Criminal Procedure Cude. We must, therefore, look elsewhere for a foundation for jurisdiction if such jurisdiction exists in the Kanara Courts. We have looked elsewhere, un ler the assistance afforded us by the counsel for the Junaghad State on the one hand and the Government Pleader on the other and we have undoubtedly derived great assistance from their arguments.