- (1.) This Rule was issued by this Court calling upon the Municipal Magistrate of Calcutta to show cause why the conviction of the petitioners under Section 574 of the Calcutta Municipal Act read with Section 408 and the sentences of fine imposed upon them should not he set aside.
(2.) It is not necessary to go into an elaborate examination of the facts of this case, but it is sufficient to state that the General Committee of the Corporation caused a written notice to be served upon the owners of the property in question calling upon them to carry out improvements under Section 408 of the Calcutta Municipal Act. At the time when this notice was served upon them, the property was the subject-matter of litigation, namely, a suit for partition was then pending on the Original Side of this Court. A decree for partition was made on the 15th of May 1905, and on the very next day the petitioners gave notice to the Corporation under Section 419 of the Calcutta Municipal Act, that they intended to make such changes in the property as would take the land out of the category of bustee lands. Meanwhile, however, on the 2nd May, an application had been made to the Municipal Magistrate by the Corporation for the prosecution of the petitioners under Section 408, read with Section 574.
(3.) It is now contended before me that the conviction ought to be set aside, inasmuch as no offence has been committed within the meaning of Section 574 read with Section 408. Section 574 (I am quoting so much of it as may be supposed to have any application to the facts of the present case) provides that "whoever fails to comply with any direction lawfully given to him or any requisition lawfully made upon him under any of the clauses" specified in that section, Section 408 being one of the sections so specified--"shall be punished with fine, which may extend to the amount mentioned in that behalf in the third column of the said table.";