SHRIRAM & OTHERS versus THE STATE OF BOMBAY

Citation: [1961] 2 S.C.R. 890 · Decided: 05-12-1960 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: SYED JAFFER IMAM · Disposal: Dismissed
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Judgment (excerpt)

890 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[1961] 
I96o 
out any such statutory rule and except making a 
-- l) 
general grievance that too many persons have been 
Rameshwa' 
ayal recruited from the Bar, he was unable even to sub-
State 0;·Ptmjab stantiate that the one-third reservation made in 
favour of the service members has been violated. In 
s. I<. Das J. 
any case, unless there is clear proof of a breach of a 
statutory rule in making any of the appointments 
under consideration here, the point does not merit 
any discussion. 
Such proof is singularly lacking in 
this case. 
De&e•nbet 5. 
In the result, the appeal fails and is dismissed with 
costs. 
Appeal dismissed. 
SHRIRAM & OTHERS 
v. 
THE STATE OF BOMBAY 
(JAFER IMAM, K. SuBBA RAO and RAGHUBAR 
DAYAL, JJ.) 
Critninal Trial-Commitment-If can be 1nadP. u;ithout record-
ing any evidence-Duty of Committing Court-Code of Criminal 
Procedure, z898 (V of z898), s. 207-A. 
On the date fixed for the inquiry the prosecution intimated to 
the Magistrate that it did not intend to examine any witness in 
the Magistrate's Court. The Magistrate adjourned the inquiry 
to consider whether it was necessary to record any evidence 
before commitment. On the adjourned date he expressed his 
opinion that no witnesses need be exan1ined, framed charges 
against the appellants and committed them to the Sessions 
Court. The appellants contended that the Magistrate had no 
jurisdiction to commit them to Sessions \vithout examining 
witnesses under sub-s. (4) of s. 207-A of the Code of Criminal 
Procedure. 
Held, that the order of commitment was valid and the 
Magistrate had jurisdiction to make it without recording any 
evidence. The position under s. 207-A of the Code is tbat:-
(i) the Magistrate is bound to take evidence of only such 
eye-witnesses as are actually produced by the prosecution before 
the Committing Court; 
2 S.C.R. SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
891 
(ii) the Magistrate, if he is of opinion that it is in the 
interests of justice to take evidence, whether of eye-witnesses or . . 
of others, he has a duty to do so; 
Shriram & Others 
(iii) the Magistrate, if he is not of that opinion and if the 
The ;;ate of 
prosecution has not examined any eye-witnesses, he has jurisdic-
Bombay 
ti on to discharge or commit the accused on the basis of the docu-
ments referred to in s. 173 of the Code; 
(iv) the d.iscretion of the Magistrate is a judicial dis-
cretion which is liable to be corrected by a superior Court. 
Macherla Hanumantha Rao v. The State of Andhra Pradesh, 
[1958] S.C R. 396, relied on. 
CRIMINAL 
APPELLATE 
JURISDICTION: 
Criminal 
Appeals Nos. 57 and 58 of 1960. 
Appeals by special leave from the judgment and 
order dated November 5/6, 1958, of the Bombay High 
Court at Nagpur in Criminal Appeal No. 94 of 1958. 
Jai Gopal Sethi and G. 0. Mathur, for the appellant 
(in Cr. A. No. 57 of 1960). 
G. O. Mathur, for the appellant (in Cr. A. No. 58 
of 1960). 
Gopal Singh and D. Gupta, for the respondent. 
1960. December 5. The Judgment of the ·Court 
was delivered by 
Sul!BA RAO, J.-These two appeals raise rather an Subba Rao J. 
important question on the interpretation of the provi-
sions of s. 207 A of the Criminal Procedure Code (here-
inafter referred to as the Code). 
The facts that have given rise to these appeals may 
be briefly stated. The appeals arise out of an incident 
that took place on November 29, 1957, when one 
Sadashiv was murdered in the courtyard of his house 
in village Nimgaon. The case of the prosecution was 
that the four appellants, armed with sticks, went to 
the house of the deceased, dragged him out of the 
house and beat him with sticks in the courtyard; and 
that as a result of the be.a.ting he died on the next 
day at a.bout 5 p.m. at Bhandara Hospital. After 
investigation, the police submitted their report to the 
Magistrate under s. 173 of the Code along with the 
relevant· documents. After forwarding the report, 
the officer in charge of the police station furnished 
892 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[1961] 
i96o 
the appellants with a copy of the report forwarded 
Sh . -; 0 h 
under sub-s. (1) of s. 173, the First Information Report 
riram c.-
l ers 
d 
v. 
recor ed under s. 154 and all other documents or 
Th• stat• of 
relevant extracts thereof on which the prosecution 
Bombay 
proposed to rely, including the statements recorded 
under sub-s. (3) of s. 161 and also intimated them of 
Subba Rao J. the persons the prosecution proposed to examine as 
its witn
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