In Re: Kista Pillai and Another

The petitioners in these two revision cases were respectively the 2nd and the 3rd accused in C.C. No. 42 of 1946 on the file of the Additional

First Class Magistrate, Chingleput. It is unnecessary for the purpose of these cases to refer at any length to the details of the convictions and the

sentences. I have listened to a long argument on behalf of the petitioners but the only point that need be dealt with is the one as to jurisdiction.

It has been found by both the lower Courts that the two petitioners were members of an unlawful assembly which pelted stones at the Indo-

Ceylon Express on the 26th of February, 1946, and that the assembly continued from about 8 a.m. till about 10 a.m. As to what happened at

about 8 a.m., there is no dispute that the occurrence was on the Saidapet side and therefore within the local limits of the jurisdiction of the

Additional First Class Magistrate, Chingleput. The case for the prosecution was that about 10 a.m., stones were thrown from the City side

towards Saidapet side of the railway line. It is in regard to this latter part of the occurrence that the point as to jurisdiction is raised. It is said that

the Additional First Class Magistrate, Chingleput, had no jurisdiction to deal with what was alleged to have happened at about 10 a.m., and that

the Magistrates'' Courts in the city could alone have dealt with it. There is a concurrent finding by both the Courts below that there were not two

separate offences but it was a continuous offence throughout the whole time. The crowd which had assembled at about 8 a.m., and which did

considerable damage by way of injury to persons and damage to properties temporarily dispersed when there was shooting by the Police but they

formed immediately thereafter into smaller groups and continued to be on the spot till about 10 a.m., when the train started and there was again

pelting of stones at the train. Mr. Rajagopalan, advocate for the petitioners, has invited me to say that they were two totally unconnected

transactions but having gone through the material evidence and the findings of the Courts below I have no hesitation whatever in saying that the

Courts below have arrived at the correct conclusion. Both the occurrences, if they may be so described are really parts of one continuous rioting

and there can be no doubt that the third clause of Section 182 of the Code of Criminal Procedure will apply. It runs as follows:

...Where an offence is a continuing one, and continues to be committed in more local areas than one�it may be inquired into"" or tried by a Court

having jurisdiction over any of such local areas.

The offence of rioting is a continuing one. There is, therefore, no absence of jurisdiction in the Additional First Class Magistrate, Chingleput. The

learned Counsel for the petitioners has also been unable to point out how, assuming that there was an absence of jurisdiction in the trying

Magistrate, that error has occasioned a failure of justice.

Mr. Rajagopalan attempted to argue several other points which in my opinion are concluded by the concurrent findings of the Courts below. I

am not only note persuaded that those findings are perverse but I consider that they are reasonable and proper conclusions to arrive at on the

evidence on record.

I do not consider the sentences excessive having regard to the circumstances in which the offences were committed.

The revision cases are therefore dismissed.