KANHAYA LAL NAND LAL Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a rule directed against an order of Mr. P.N. Bhanot convicting the petitioner and sentencing him to imprisonment till the rising of the Court and to a fine of Rs. 10,000/ - and of confiscation of the cotton cloth. On appeal the learned Additional Sessions Judge upheld the conviction and the order of confiscation of cloth, but the amount of fine was reduced to Rs. 7,000/ -.

(2.) THE sole point for determination in this case is whether the provisions of Section 11 of the Essential Supplies (Temporary Powers) Act have been complied with.

(3.) ON the 31st of March, 1948, Nawal Kishore, Assistant Director of Civil Supplies, Delhi, received information through one Mr. Tandon of the Hindustan Mercantile Association that some mill -made cotton cloth had been booked from the Delhi Railway Station. At 11 P. M. he went to the Railway Station and he asked the Station Superintendent not to allow the packages to be moved out of Delhi. On the following day, i.e., the 1st of April, 1948, he along with others went to the Railway Station and had the packages opened and found that it contained 'dhoties'. As there was no permit the petitioner and some others were arrested. It was alleged that Murari Lal Vaish had booked the packages of which the owner was Kanhya Lal petitioner. Seven persons, Kanhya Lal, Murari Lal and five others were prosecuted and there was a protracted trial. On one excuse or another the accused persons got postponement of their cases and record shows lamentable lack of vigilance on the part of the trial Court. The case was allowed to be unnecessarily prolonged and it was not until the 12th of September, 1950, that the trial finished. The learned Magistrate should have realised that cases of this kind require an early, though not a hurried, decision and the way the trial proceeded shows that nobody was anxious to finish the case. The accused persons were on bail and it gives me an impression as if they were bent upon prolonging the trial as long as possible. It is things of this kind, in cases under the Essential Supplies (Temporary Powers) Act and other Acts of similar kind, which give a bad name to the judiciary and produce, in the minds of people, a suspicion as regards the efficacy of trials by magistrates. The prosecution produced three witnesses and other important witnesses became untraceable, I suppose due to the prolonged trial. Six of the accused persons were acquitted and Kanhya Lal pleaded guilty and admitted that he had booked the cloth from Delhi to Lilwa without any permit and he was convicted and sentenced as I have stated above.