- (1.) PUNNI Lal has filed this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. He was a peon in the Cantonment Board, Allahabad, and was getting a salary of Rs. 55 per month for the last twenty-four years as alleged by him. From the office of the Cantonment Board, two typewriters were stolen in the night between 10 and 11 February 1960.
(2.) THE Executive Officer of the Board lodged a first Information report with the police. On the following morning, the Executive Officer sent for the petitioner at 8 a. m. and maltreated him. Thereafter, he handed over the petitioner to the police without any reasonable cause. He was taken in police custody and was given severe beating and subjected to torture. He was released at 10 p. m. and he got his injuries medically examined. After four or five days. he filed a complaint against the Executive Officer as well as the local police under Sections 342, 323, 504 and 109 of the Indian Penal Code. The Judicial Officer, Karchhana, Allahabad, after making enquiry under Section 202 of the Code of Criminal Procedure dismissed the complaint on the ground that no previous sanction for prosecuting the Executive Officer had been obtained as required by Section 197 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. A petition in revision against that order was also dismissed by the Sessions Judge.
(3.) ACCORDING to the petitioner, no sanction was necessary for the prosecution of the Executive Officer on the facts of the case as the act of the Executive Officer was not an official one.;