EMPEROR Vs. SHIVBHAT MANJUNATHBHAT HATTANGADI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The applicant in this case has been convicted under Section 101 of the Indian Railways Act IX of 1890, in that he, when on duty as Station Master, did endanger the safety of persons by disobeying certain general rules under the Act. The particular rules that are specified in the judgments of the two lower Courts are Rules 51, 109 and 112. He was sentenced by the trying Magistrate to suffer rigorous imprisonment for one day and to pay a fine of Rs. 300, in default to suffer three months rigorous imprisonment. On appeal, this conviction and sentence were confirmed by the Sessions Judge.

(2.) In the application for revision two preliminary points have been taken, as they were in both the lower Courts; and it may be added that the applicant came to this Court even while this trial was pending and raised these two points as being a bar to his trial, but this Court decided that he should take the points at the trial and that it was undesirable and inconvenient that this Court should deal with them without proper materials at the stage at which the applicant sought this Court's intervention. Both the lower Courts have rejected the contention that the trying Magistrate had no jurisdiction, which is repeated before us in revision.

(3.) The first ground on which it is contended that there was this bar of jurisdiction is baaed on the proviso to Sub-rule (1) of Rule 26 of the General Rules and Orders made under Section 84 of the Indian Railways Act, reproduced at page 178 &c, of the General Statutory Rules and Orders, Vol. III (1926). The effect of this proviso is that, once the District Magistrate himself has started an enquiry, or has deputed a Subordinate Magistrate to make, such enquiry, under Rule 20 of these rules, the railway police, who otherwise have power under Rule 26 to make an investigation into an accident, are debarred from making such an enquiry. The exact wording of the proviso is : "Provided that no such investigation (that is, an investigation by the railway police) shall be made when an enquiry has been commenced or ordered under Clause (a) or Clause (b) of Rule 20." In the present case, the enquiry was ordered by the District Magistrate under Clause (b) of Rule 20. The exact date on which he gave his order has not been elicited in evidence, although the defence called the Chitnis of the District Magistrate with the papers and tried to ascertain the exact date. The Chitnis, however, said that he did not know the date and had no authority to give information from the papers. It is, however, in evidence that on May 28, 1926, the Sub-Inspector received a Yadi from the Magistrate who had been ordered to make the enquiry, asking him to attend at the enquiry at a certain date, and the lower Court, in its judgment, has taken May 28 as the date on which the order of the District Magistrate was made. It is objected that this is unfair to the defence and that the difficulties, that were put in the way of their ascertaining the exact date, were unjustified. It is not, I think, necessary for us to go into that particular point, because the main answer that is made on behalf of the prosecution to this plea (viz., that the police had no authority to make a police investigation and start any proceedings in a Magistrate's Court upon that investigation) is that the investigation had already been completed on May 12, 1926; and that has been held proved by both the lower Courts and there is no reason shown why that finding should not be accepted.