MRS ANNIE BESANT Vs. ADVOCATE GENERAL OF MADRAS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These are two appeals for which the appellant, Mrs., Besant, obtained special leave from His Majesty in Council against two decisions of the High Court of Judicature at Madras.

(2.) They arise in the following circumstances :-There are in India two legislative Acts of the Governor-General of India in Council relating to printing, one being The Printing Presses and Newspapers Act No. XXV of 1S67. and the other being Act No. I of 1910 entitled "An Act to provide for the better control of the Press, " and shortly " The Indian Press Act, 1910. " Under the first Act, Section 4, the person who keeps in his possession a printing press must make and subscribe a declaration before a Magistrate, stating that he has a press for printing, and where it is situated. And by Section 5 no printed periodical work containing public news, or comments on public news, shall be published without the printer and publisher making a declaration stating that he is the printer or publisher, the name of the periodical and the place where the printing or publishing is conducted.

(3.) Under the second Act, Section 3, Sub-section 1, the person making the declaration is required to deposit before a Magistrate in money, or in certain securities, a sum not being leas than Rs. 500, or more than Rs. 2,000, as the Magistrate may think fit to require.