PUBLIC PROSECUTOR Vs. SYED ROWTHER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS appeal possesses a considerable degree of interest, from the point of view of the citizen and of the rights of the general public in relation to departmental officers, such as officers entrusted with the implementation of the provisions of the Madras General Sales Tax Act, (Madras Act IX of 1939). What has actually happened in this case is that the learned Sub-divisional Magistrate of Dindigul tried the two respondents upon the following charges : that on 21st July, 1958, at Dindigul, they used criminal force to Thangiah (P.W. 1), the Special Assistant Commercial Tax Officer of Dindigul, with intent to prevent or deter him from discharging his duties as a public servant and thereby committed an offence under section 353, Indian Penal Code, 1860, and that the same accused (the respondents) obstructed the inspection of accounts by the aforesaid Sri Thangiah (P.W. 1) and thereby committed an offence punishable under section 15(2)(b) of the Madras General Sales Tax Act. The learned Sub-divisional Magistrate dealt with the facts of the evidence in an elaborate judgment. He was of the view that not merely were the offences not established in the evidence for prosecution, which he was not inclined to believe, but that when it was not shown that the respondents were "dealers" the entry of the officers into the house was "nothing short of trespass on a residential house."

(2.) THE State has filed the appeal from the acquittals of the respondents under section 353 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 and section 15(2)(b) of the Madras General Sales Tax Act. I think that this case illustrates, very acutely, the danger of the action of departmental officers, who imperfectly apprehend their powers and duties. THEre may be some excuse for a layman to be ignorant concerning the precise demarcation of his legal rights in relation to governmental agencies. But there is no such excuse for departmental officers entrusted with the implementation of a comparatively short enactment, like the Madras General Sales Tax Act (Madras Act IX of 1939). Democracy cannot function with health and safety, if governmental agencies do not realise that, where they act in exercise of any statutory power, they must strictly keep within the bounds of that power, and respect the rights of the citizen to the extent compatible with the exercise of such powers. In the present case, I do not propose to proceed into the facts of the evidence at any great length. I do not wish to comment upon the appreciation of the evidence by the Magistrate, or upon the grounds assigned by him for holding that the prosecution witnesses were not precisely angels of truth, and that there was a great deal to be said for the testimonies of P.Ws. 1 and 2 to the effect that this was really an intrusion upon domestic premises with very little justification for it.

(3.) HE may enter any place ostensibly used for the conduct of business as such, as an office, shop, godown etc. but if he is going to enter a private house and to intrude on the privacy of strangers, he must be thoroughly satisfied that he could prove that this was a place in which business was being actually conducted. Unless he was in this position, his entry into a private house will not be authorised under section 14(3), and may well constitute civil trespass the learned Magistrate was perfectly correct in pointing this out.In the present case, without any prior formal relationship or history of assessment, preceding the incident, we find these officers forcing an entry into the private house of the first respondent, and attempting to seize some note books, on the allegation that they were accounts of the business. This is totally outside the purview of the powers vesting in such officers, under section 14(3) of the Act. If the officers so desired, under circumstances of that kind, they could have moved the police authorities for a search of the premises, or for obtaining a search warrant. The record does not even show either (i) that the respondents really carried on business as "dealers" anywhere, or (ii) that there was no other place where the business was being carried on, as official premises. Since the information was to the effect that business was being carried on in paddy and rice, large scale business as P.W. 1 has deposed, it is difficult to believe that the business itself was being transacted in living rooms in a private house. On the whole, there can be doubt that the entry of these officers into the private house of the respondents was not merely unfortunate, but was unauthorised and illegal, in the absence of evidence to show that this was a place of business. This entry did constitute trespass.