RAMKISTO SAHU Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE two applications have been heard together. The application which has been registered as Criminal Miscellaneous No. 223 of 1951 is for the transfer of a case under Section 211 of the Indian Penal Code, pending in the Court of Mr. J. P. Singh, Subdivisional Magistrate of Khunti, from his file to the file of any other competent Magistrate, and the application which has been registered as Criminal Revision No. 575 of 1951 is an application for directing a further enquiry into the case on account of the dismissal of which the petitioner is being prosecuted under Section 211 of the Indian Penal Code.

(2.) ON the 8th of May, 1950, the petitioner lodged a first information report at the Tamar police station in which certain very serious allegations were made by him against the Inspector of Amins, deputed for the demarcation of forests, a Forest Guard and certain constables of the Armed Force. The occurrence was alleged to have taken place on that very day at 9 A.M. and the first information re- port was lodged at 4 P. M. The allegations were that the abovementioned persons went to the shop or the house of the complainant and asked him to supply flour, sugar and ghee, Neither the complainant nor his brother Gangadhar Sahu, who happened to be at the shop at the time, was prepared to supply them anything until the price was paid : and when Gangadhar Sahu demanded the price, he was assaulted and dragged out of the shop. The applicant, on seeing this, went inside his house and from there saw his brother Sadhu Sahu and a co-villager of his named Dina Sahu being assaulted by the constables and the Inspector. The constables kept a watch on his house, but he managed to get out after scaling the walls and ran to the house of one Raghunandan Sahu. At Raghunandan Sahu's place he learnt from Sadhu Sahu and Dina Sahu that the Inspector and the members of the Armed Force had assaulted them and had extorted a sum of Rs. 5/- from each of them. The village chaukidar was then called and informed about the occurrence, and the petitioner started for the police station where he lodged the first information report. The police took up the investigation of the case, but they submitted a final report 'false' and recommended the prosecution of the complainant under Section 211 of the Indian Penal Code. The learned Subdivisional Magistrate, therefore held a judicial enquiry and after the enquiry agreed with the police report that the case was maliciously false. The report of the learned magistrate is dated the 26th of August, 1950 and on the 18th of September, 1950, the petitioner filed a protest petition on which the learned magistrate passed the following order:

(3.) THE learned Counsel appearing for the State could not support the view that an elaborate enquiry of such a nature at the initial stage was justified and he was inclined to think that the report of the learned Subdivisional Magistrate is really a report on the question as to whether a prosecution under Section 211 of the Indian Penal Code would. be justified. But, in my opinion, the learned State Counsel was wrong in making this submission because what I find is that on the very day on which the learned Subdivisional Magistrate passed the order that he would hold a judicial enquiry, he passed the following order on the report recommending the prosecution of the applicant under Section 211 of the Indian Penal Code :