State vs Nand Lal and Another

Chopra, J.—This is an appeal by the State u/s 417, Criminal P.C. against the order of Magistrate, Ist Class, Sangrur, acquitting Mathra Das and Nand Lal, respondents, of an offence u/s 7, Essential Supplies Ordinance.. As the result of a trap laid and raid conducted by the District Magistrate, Sangrur, on 5th at the Water-Mills of Nidampur three persons, namely Rakha Ram, Mathra Das and Nand Lal were hauled up for having sold 10 seers of wheat flour for Rs. 5/- i.e. at the rate of Rs. 20/- per maund while the rate fixed for the commodity for the place those days was Rs. 13/2/- per maund. The currency note of Rs. 5/- signed by the District Magistrate, which had been handed over to Kahan Singh and Kaku Singh the presumptive purchasers and decoy witnesses employed by the District Magistrate, was recovered after the sale from Nand Lal and wheat flour weighing 10 seers from the two witnesses. Nand Lal is stated to have actually weighed and passed on the flour to the witnesses in the presence of Mathra Das, No case was held to have been made out against Rakha Ram and he was, therefore, discharged. As regards the respondents, the trial Magistrate believed the prosecution evidence in its entirety and found it to be established beyond doubt that they had sold 10 seers of wheat flour to Kalian Singh and Kaku Singh. The respondents were, however, acquitted of the charge because in the opinion of the learned Magistrate no rate for the sale of wheat and consequently of flour had been fixed under the Essential Supplies Ordinance for the particular place where it was sold. He further held that the rates fixed for village Nidampur, which according to him only meant the Abadi of the village, could not be regarded as the maximum rate for the sale of the commodities at the Water Mills.

In order to get at a clear understanding of the points involved reference has to be made to the relevant law and the notifications issued by the Government thereunder. Section 3, Essential Supplies (Temporary Powers) Ordinance 7 of 2003 Bk. authorises the Government of the State for the purpose of maintaining or increasing supplies of any essential commodity or for securing their equitable distribution, to control and fix the prices at which any such commodity may be bought or sold. Section 4 of this Ordinance further authorises the Government to delegate all or any of the powers conferred on it by Section 3 to any authority subordinate to it by means of a notified order in that behalf. S. Amar Nath Kashyap, Director, Civil Supplies Pepsu, in exercise of the powers so conferred on him issued Notification No. 168 of 20-4-1950 which was published in the Pepsu Government Gazette of 30-4-1950. Clause 4 of this Notification reads as follows:

The maximum wholesale price of wheat or barley or gram in the villages of its origin situated at a distance of five miles or less from the nearest mandi shall be four annas per maund less than the maximum price fixed for that mandi, and the maximum wholesale price of wheat or barley or gram in such villages situated at a distance of more than five miles from the nearest mandi shall be six annas per maund less the price fixed for that mandi.

Provision for the price of wheat flour was made in Article 5(a) of the Notification in the following terms:

Wheat atta shall not be sold at any mandi, village or any other area at a price exceeding the price of wheat fixed for that mandi, village or area by more than 12/- per maund or such other amount as the Director of Civil Supplies may fix from time to time.

The same authority under the very same powers made another order on 1-6-1950 which was published as Notification No. 176 in the State Gazette of 11-6-1950. Maximum rates of wheat and bailey for different mandis of the State upto 30-6-1950 and from 1-7-1950 till further orders were fixed by this Notification. The maximum rate of wheat operative from 1-7-1950 for Mandi Bhawanigarh was Rs. 12/10/- per maund.

It is not disputed that the nearest Mandi for village Nidampur is the one at Bhawanigarh and that the village is situate within a distance of five miles from that Mandi. It consequently follows that the maximum rate for the sale of wheat of its origin in village Nidampur for the particular, period, i.e. 5-2-1951 when the sale in question is allege ed to have taken place, was fixed at Rs. 12/6/- per maund. The control price for the sale of atta at that place on the particular day according to Clause 5(a) of the notification comes to Rs. 13/2/- per maund. If this rate was meant for the Water Mills also, the person or persons who sold the atta at the rate of Rs. 20/- per maund, contravened the provisions of the Ordinance and was or were, therefore, liable u/s 7, Essential Supplies Ordinance. The main contention of the respondents, which found favour with the trial Magistrate, is that the Water Mills do not fall in village Nidampur and therefore, the rate fixed for that village did not apply to the mills. The question that necessarily arises is as to what is meant; by the word ''village'' as used in the Notification whether it means only, the space built upon for residential purposes i.e. the Abadi, as held by the trial Magistrate, or it also includes the land or area attached to the village. It is correct that the word is not defined by the Ordinance or any notification issued thereunder nor has it been shown to be defined by any other Act in which the word occurs. But surely it is not a word to understand the connotation, of which there may be much of difficulty. In. a popular sense it means what in vernacular we call Mauza, Gaon, or Pind, and it is a matter of common knowledge what these terms mean and include. A gaon or a pind will not be understood by any villager to mean only the residential portion of it but in common parlance it will also include the lands of the villagers residing in it. Every villager knows how far his village extends and can point out the place wherefrom the boundaries of the next one commence. I do not think any one would take it to mean and include merely the collection of houses and I have no hesitation to hold that it means the whole estate or Mouza and includes all other places within the boundaries of the village area. Besides the Abadi Deh it also includes the Gora Deh, Shamlat Deh and practically all the area owned by a village community. According to Mr. Thomson''s definition a village is "a parcel or parcels of lands having a separate name in the Revenue records and known limits." In the Law Lexicon by P, Ramanath Iyer, it is stated to include (a) village community, (b) village lands; and (c) rivers passing through or by village-lands. In England the term is used for a tract of land with some houses, forming a unit for purposes of national police and taxation. Section 15, Punjab Preemption Act describes the persons in whom a right of preemption vests in respect of sales of agricultural land and village immovable property and its Section 3(2) defines Village immovable property'' to mean immovable property within the limits of a village other than agricultural land. The question as to what is meant by a ''village'', therefore, arose in some of the cases under the Pre-emption Act in the Punjab. - ''Devi Dayal v. Muhammad Amin'' 89 Pun Re 1910 was one of those cases, and in it Ryves J. made the following observations:

I think the definition in Sub-section (2) applies to all immovable property within the limits of a village and that it is not confined to immovable property actually within the existing abadi of a village. I think the word, village in this section does not mean merely a collection of houses, but means the whole estate or Mauza and includes everything within the boundaries of the village area.

In - ''Kadir Bakhsh v. Ghulam'' 74 Pun Re 1897 , ''village'' was held to mean an area owned by a village community. In - ''Diwan Chand v. Nizam-ud-din'' AIR 1924 Lah 662 Shadi Lal C.J. observed that:

the expression ''village'' connotes ordinarily an area occupied by a body of men mainly depending upon agriculture or occupations subservient thereto.

This definition was again accepted by Jai Lal J. in - ''Mst. Kapuri v. Kanshi Ram'' AIR 1927 Lah 799 For all these reasons I am unable to endorse the view of the trial Magistrate that a village means and includes only the Abadi Deh. Sardar Tirath Singh, the learned Counsel for the respondents, also has frankly conceded his inability to support that view.

I cannot convince myself to agree with the learned trial Magistrate that the use of the words "or any other area" along with Mandi and village in Clause 5(a) of the said Notification lends support to the conclusion arrived at by him. It is correct that these words do not find place in Clause 4 and the effect of it is that no maximum wholesale price of the commodities can be regarded as fixed for places which do not fall within a village and consequently the price of flour for those places. One can readily conceive of an area, within or beyond a radius of five miles from a mandi, which may not be included in a village, but that does not mean that the word village was used in a limited sense and was not meant to include the area appertaining to it.

It has then to be seen, whether the Water Mills in question fall within the boundaries of village Nidampur. In the first instance, the mills are admittedly known as ''Gharat Nidampur'' or Nidampur Water Mills. They are situate at a distance of 3 or 4 furlongs from the abadi of the village. We have got it in the evidence of the two patwaries examined by the prosecution - one of whom is the local patwari - that the mills are within the boundaries of village Nidampur. The statement of Niranjan Singh P.W. 4 is also to the same effect. This fact was further unequivocally admitted by Jagat Singh a witness examined in defence. There is nothing on the record to suggest to the contrary. It has, therefore, to be held that the Water Mills fall within the area of Nidampur and that the Notification fixing the control prices for village Nidampur applies for all intents and purposes to the mills as well.

The second ground on which the acquittal of the respondents was based is equally fallacious. It is correct that Clause 4 fixed the maximum price for wheat, barley, etc., in the villages of their origin, but in the present case we have to see to the application of Clause 5(a) in which the words "of its origin" do not recur. Clause fixes the price of wheat in the village of its origin, but no such distinction is made in Clause 5(a) and for its purpose the ''atta'' may be of wheat of any origin. The price of atta is only to be gauged from the standard price of wheat in the village.

On merits the evidence against Mathra Das respondent is too meager to hold him guilty of the offence for which he was charged. The mere fact that he was a contractor of the mills cannot be regarded as sufficient to hold him liable for the sale in question nor would his presence alone carry the matter any further. It is possible he had no knowledge at what rate and for what price the atta was sold. We have only the evidence of Kahan Singh P.W. 1 on the point, who deposed that Mathra Das asked Nand Lal to weigh the atta. The witness did not state that any rate or price for the atta was settled with Mathra Das or that the latter had asked Nand Lal to get for it the price charged. The payment was admittedly made to Nand Lal and it was from him that the signed currency note was recovered. The appeal so far as it relates to Mathra Das is, therefore, dismissed.

The case of Nand Lal, however, is quite different. There is clear and convincing evidence that he weighed the atta, passed it on to the purchasers and charged for it more than the control price. There is overwhelming and reliable evidence, including that of the District Magistrate, that the signed five rupee note delivered in payment of the price for the atta was recovered from Nand Lal and 10 seers of atta was got from the purchasers. The defence, that he charged only the control price and that he had returned the balance of Rs. 1/12/- to the purchasers was simply an after-thought and has, therefore, been rightly rejected by the trial Magistrate. If that had been the case Nand Lal would surely have disclosed it to the officers at the spot when they got the currency note from him and put him under arrest. He would have also requested them to make a search of the person of the purchaser for the balance he had paid him. No question on the point was put to any of the prosecution witnesses and this makes me conclude that the defence which was taken for the first time at the close of the trial, was simply an after thought and a faked up story. For all these reasons I would accept the State appeal so far as Nand Lal is concerned and hold him guilty of an offence u/s 7, Essential Supplies Ordinance. In the matter of sentence I am inclined to think he deserves some leniency. He remained in the Judicial Lock-up as an under-trial for 17 days and had besides to face the expenses of litigation both in the trial Court as well as in this Court. The ends of justice would be met, if he is sentenced to fine alone. He is, therefore, directed to pay Rs. 25/- as fine which he has paid. The bail bonds of the respondents consequently stand cancelled.

Passey, J.

I agree.