KESHAB NATH BHATTACHARYA Vs. MANIR-UD-DIN SARKAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) It appears that a dacoity was committed in the house of the plaintiffs in this case on the 27 December 1903. An enquiry was made and in the end the defendants, Manir-ud-din and Reaj-ud-din, were arrested and sent up for trial. Both of them made confessions. Reaj-ud-din, we understand, was discharged in the commitment Court, and Manir-ud-din was tendered a pardon and gave evidence in the Sessions Court. The persons who were accused in that case were acquitted. Thereafter the plaintiffs brought this suit for damages against these two defendants, alleging that they had collected the dacoits, advanced money to them, instigated them to plunder the plaintiffs house and helped them with weapons. Five issues were fixed for trial in the case. The learned Subordinate Judge has disposed of the case on the 4 issue only leaving the remaining issues undecided. The 4 issue runs as follows: "Did the defendants in collusion with each other cause the alleged dacoity to be committed in the house of the plaintiffs." The learned Subordinate Judge has found that there is no trustworthy evidence to show that the defendants caused the dacoity to be committed. He apparently holds that it is not the plaintiffs case that the defendants aided or abetted the dacoity, and that even if that had been the case still on the evidence it could not be found that the defendants had aided or abetted the dacoity. Considering, therefore, that the plaintiffs had failed to prove their case he dismissed the suit. The plaintiffs accordingly appeal.

(2.) It is argued on behalf of the plaintiffs that it has been their case from the beginning that the defendants instigated the dacoity and were not themselves participators in the actual commission of the crime. This appears to be so. There is nothing in the plaint to indicate that the defendants themselves joined in the commission of the dacoity. The plaintiff's case was that the defendants financed the dacoits and were privy to the dacoity. It remains to he seen, therefore, whether they have established this case in Court.

(3.) We may say at the outset that they have failed, in our opinion, to establish any case against the defendant Reaj-ud-din. The evidence upon which the plaintiffs, relied is to the effect that Reaj-ud-din knew nothing of the dacoity until the day after it was committed, and that all he did was to take charge of certain articles which had been taken in the dacoity and come into the possession of the other defendant. There is no reason at all disclosed in evidence for holding that Reaj-ud-din was privy to the dacoity, and under these circumstances the decision of the Subordinate Judge with respect to him was, in our opinion, perfectly right.