HANWANT Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The applicant, Hanwant has been bound over under Section 110, Criminal P.C., and required to execute a bond in a sum of Rs. 200 with two sureties each in like amounts to be of good behaviour for a period of one year on the ground that he is so desperate and dangerous as to render his being at large without security hazardous to the community.

(2.) Fifty-two witnesses were produced on behalf of the prosecution and 55 on behalf of the defence. The Courts below have accepted the evidence produced on behalf of the prosecution and have not relied upon the defence evidence, one of the grounds being that only one out of the 55 witnesses produced on behalf of the defence lives in Kuberpur. I am not prepared to go into the findings of fact arrived at by the Courts below. There is, however, an important question of law raised on behalf of the applicant in this application.

(3.) The applicant is no doubt a resident of village Kuberpur, police circle Kundaria, Tahsil Jalalabad, within the jurisdiction of the Sub-divisional Magistrate who tried the case. His father and other relations also live in Kuberpur. But it has been found by the Courts below that after a certain marpit in which the applicant was also injured he went to his father-in-law in village Rajpuri on 16 September 1945 and has been living there since then. The present proceedings were initiated on a police report which bears the date 17 November 1945. It is said that only a Sub- divisional Magistrate within whose jurisdiction the person complained against is living at the date on which the complaint is made to such Magistrate can proceed against him under Section 110, Criminal P.C. It is immaterial that the person against whom such complaint is made has in fact been carrying on his activities within the jurisdiction of such Magistrate. If he has left the jurisdiction of such Magistrate and is living outside the limits of such jurisdiction, the Magistrate, it is pointed out, has no jurisdiction to try him under Section 110, Criminal P.C. This appears to be the plain meaning of the section the relevant words of which are: Whenever...a Sub-divisional Magistrate...receives information that any person within the local limits of his jurisdiction is by habit a robber, etc...such Magistrate may...require such person to show cause why he should not be ordered to execute a bond, with sureties, for his good behaviour for such period, not exceeding three years, as the Magistrate thinks fit to fix. If the person against whom the complaint is made has gone outside the jurisdiction of the Magistrate, he has on a plain reading of the section, no jurisdiction to take proceedings against him under that section.