Altogether four witnesses were examined in the case, two on behalf of the prosecution and two for the accused persons.
On December 28, 1953, a bench of the Gram Cutcherry acquitted all the accused persons.
The relevant facts are these.
The appeal was heard on June 24, 1954, and the full bench by a majority, with three dissentient panches, held the three appellants guilty of the offence under s. 379, Indian Penal Code, and sentenced them to imprisonment for fifteen days each.
On this evidence, there was numberlegal basis for the companyviction of Ramdeo Singh and Sheodhar Singh.
The two witnesses examined on behalf of the prosecution definitely said that they saw Baldeo Singh appellant and two other named persons who have been acquitted, but did number identify the remaining persons who also forcibly cut and removed the crops.
The appellants then moved the High Court of Patna under Arts.
One Uma Shankar Prasad instituted a case against eight persons, including the three appellants before us, Baldeo Singh, Ramdeo Singh and Sheodhar Singh, on the allegation that they had forcibly cut and removed urad and kodo crops from his field in village Darwan on October 1, 1953, at about 10 a.m. Uma Shankar said that he objected, but was threatened with assault.
On January 7, 1954, Uma Shankar Prasad preferred an appeal under s. 67 of the Act.
The third and last companytention on behalf of the appellants is that the companyviction of two of the appellants, Ramdeo Singh and Sheodhar Singh, is bad, because there was numberevidence at all against them.
The appellants then moved this Court and obtained special leave under Art.
The defence of some of the accused persons was that the land on which the crops stood belonged to one Yogi Sahni, who had sold it to Sunder Singh, accused, on September 25, 1953.
The case was instituted before the Gram Cutcherry of Bankat in the district of Champaran, companystituted under the provisions of the Bihar Panchayat Raj Act, 1947 Bihar Act 7 of 1948 , hereinafter referred to as the Act.
226 and 227 of the Constitution of India.
K. Das, J. This is an appeal by special leave from an order of summary dismissal passed by the High Court of Patna on July 20, 1954, on an application under Arts.
