MANGAR KOIRI Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an application from an order of the Sessions Judge of Gaya confirming an order convicting the petitioners under Section 19(f), Arms Act, and sentencing them to rigorous imprisonment for nine months each in respect of the possession of a weapon which in the record is called a karabin, a small quantity of gunpowder and a few pieces of copper. It appears that the police searched the house of the petitioners in consequence of information that stolen property was stocked there and in the course of the search discovered the karabin, gunpowder and the copper. The petitioners had no license for the karabin and the sanction of the District Magistrate having been accorded the prosecution was launched. It has been found that the accused Mangar is the head of a joint family of which the other accused are members. The karabin and other articles were found in a loft in one of the rooms of the house concealed under bhusa stacked in the loft. There is no evidence that this room was in the particular possession of any member of the family or that any of the accused persons was in exclusive possession of the karabin. The learned Sessions Judge, founding his decision on a case decided by Bennet, J. sitting singly, Emperor V/s. Sikhdar 1932 All 441, held that in circumstances such as in the present case all the senior male members of a joint family are in possession of whatever is in the house.

(2.) The view taken by Bennet, J. in that case differs considerably from the view taken in other decisions of the Allahabad High Court and other High Courts. In Empress V/s. Sangam Lal (1893) 15 All 129, Knox and Blair, JJ. said that where articles are found in a house belonging to a joint family in such place or places as several persons living in the house may have access to, there is no presumption as to possession and control that those articles are in the possession and control of any other person than the house master. The decision of Bennet, J. in Emperor v. Sikhdar 1932 All 441was commented on by Pullan and Thom, JJ. in Kaul Ahir v. Emperor 1933 All 112where their Lordships were not prepared to agree with the view taken by him. In the absence of proof in the present case that the room in which the weapon was kept was in the exclusive or particular possession of any member of the family, I am not prepared to hold that it can be inferred that the weapon was in the possession of any other person than the head of the family, the petitioner Mangar. I would, therefore, discharge the rule so far as this petitioner is concerned and confirm it with respect to petitioners Hulas Koiri and Bala Koiri whose convictions and sentences are set aside. Madan, J.

(3.) I agree.