KANGSARI HALDAR & ANOTHER versus THE STATE OF WEST BENGAL

Citation: [1960] 2 S.C.R. 646 · Decided: 18-12-1959 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: BHUVNESHWAR PRASAD SINHA · Disposal: Dismissed

Cited by 3 judgment(s) · see the full citation network in Lexace

Judgment (excerpt)

r959 
December I8. 
646 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS [1960(2)] 
KANGSARI HALDAR & ANOTHER 
v. 
TH;E STATE OF WEST BENGAL 
' 
(B. P. SINHA, C.J., P. B. GAJENDRAGADKAR, 
A. K. SARKAR, K. SUBBA RAO AND J. c. SHAH, JJ.) 
Criminal Trial-Staiute providing for trials by special Tri-
bunals of specified offences committed in distt<rbed areas during 
specified periods-Constitutionality-Reasonable classification-Test 
• 
-Tribunals of Criminal Jurisdiction Act, I952 (W.B. Act XIV of 
I952), s. 2(b), proviso to s. 4(I). 
The appellants were prosecuted for having committed 
offences under s. l20B read with ss. 302 and 436 of the Indian 
Penal Code and their case was taken up for trial before the Third 
Tribunal constituted under the West Bengal Tribnnals of Crimi-
nal Jurisdiction Act, 1952 (W.B. Act XIV of 1952). 
By a 
notification dated September 12, 1952, and issued under s. 2(b) 
of the Act the Government of West Bengal declared the whole 
area within the jurisdiction of Kakdwip and Sagar Police Stations 
to be a disturbed area and specified the period from January l, 
1948, to March 31, 1950, to be the period during which the notific-
ation was to be effective. The case against the appellants was 
that between the dates mentioned in the notification, they took 
leading part in a violent movement called the Tebhaga movement 
in Kakdwip and incited the Bhagehasis, i.e., the cultivators who 
actually cultivated the land, to claim the entire crop instead of 
2/3 share of it and that they preached murder and arson amongst 
the cultivators and such preaching was followed by arson and 
murder on a large scale. 
The appellants moved the High Court 
for an order quashing the proceedings against them on the ground 
that s. 2(b) of the Act, which allowed the Government to declare 
an area in which ''there was" disturbance in the past to be a 
disturbed area, offended Art. r4 of the Constitution as discrimin-
ating between persons who had committed the same offences 
and whose trials had already concluded before the notific~tion 
under the normal and more advantageous procedure and others 
whose trials had not concluded and who had to be tried by a less 
advantageous and special procedure prescribed by the Act. The 
application of the appellants was first heard by a bench of two 
judges but as there was difference of opinion between them the 
matter was referred to a third judge, and the High Court by a 
majority held that the provisions of the impugned Act were 
intra vires and did not offencj Art. 14 of the Constitution. 
On appeal by special leave challenging the vires of s. 2(b) 
and the proviso to s. 4(1) of the Act, 
Held (per Sinha, C.J., Gajendragadkar and Shah, JJ.), that 
the equality before law, guaranteed by Art. 14, no doubt prohibits 
class legislation but it does not prohibit the Legislature to legislate 
• 
,. 
--
S.C.R. 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
647 
on the basis of a reasonable classification. If any state of facts can 
reasonably be conceived to sustain a classification, the existence 
of that state of facts must be assumed. 
Chiranjitlal Chaudhuri v. The Union of India and Others, [r950] 
S.C.R. 869 and Kedar Nath Bajoria v. The State of West Bengal, 
[r954] S.C.R. 30, followed. 
Where the classification is reasonable and is founded on an 
intelligible differentia and that differentia has a rational relation 
to the object sought to be achieved by the statute, the validity of 
the statute cannot be successfully challenged under Art. r4. Since 
the classification made by the impugned Act is rational and the 
differentia by which offenders are classified has a rational relation 
with the object of the Act to provide for the speedy trial of the 
offences specified in the Schedule, s. 2(b) and the proviso to s. 4(r) 
of the Act cannot be said to contravene Art. r4 of the Constitu-
tion evell. though the procedure prescribed by the Act may amount 
to discrimination. 
· 
The State of West Bengal v. Anwar Ali Sarkar, [r952] S.C.R. 
284, distinguished. 
Kathi Raning Rawat v. The State of Saurashtra, [1952] S.C.R. 
435, Lachmandas Kewalram Ahuja and Another v. The State of 
Bombay, [r952] SC.R. 7ro and Gopi Chand v. Delhi Administration, 
A.LR. 1959 S.C. 609, considered. 
Per Sarkar and Subba Rao, JJ. (dissenting).-Whether a law 
offends Art. r4 or not does not depend upon whether it is prospect-
ive or retrospective for both prospective and retrospective 
statutes may contravene the provisions of that Article. Although 
the genera

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