Official Secrets Act trial forum: Sessions Court is the normal venue, and special magistrate empowerment can be withdrawn for pending cases.

Offences under the Official Secrets Act, 1923 are ordinarily triable by the Court of Sessions, because the statute treats trial by a specially empowered Metropolitan Magistrate or Magistrate of the First Class as an exception rather than the general rule. Interpreting section 13 in light of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, the Court read the special empowerment as conditional and revocable. Withdrawal of the empowerment notification was therefore effective for pending matters, and the accused had no vested right to continue before the Magistrate or to insist on the earlier forum.

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Issues: Whether offences under the Official Secrets Act, 1923 are ordinarily triable by the Court of Sessions or by a Metropolitan Magistrate specially empowered by the appropriate Government, and whether withdrawal of such special empowerment deprives pending cases of jurisdiction or preserves the accused's elected forum.

Analysis: Section 13 of the Official Secrets Act, 1923 was construed in the context of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 and the changes brought about by the deletion of the Presidency Magistrate tier. Reading the provision as a whole, the words "other than" and the parenthetical reference to a Magistrate specially empowered were treated as creating an exception to the general rule, not as conferring exclusive original jurisdiction on a Magistrate of the First Class. The Court held that, after the repeal of the old procedural hierarchy, the ordinary forum for trial under the Act is the Court of Sessions, while a Metropolitan Magistrate or Magistrate of the First Class can try such offences only if specially empowered by the appropriate Government. The withdrawal of the earlier notification rescinding such empowerment was held to be effective for pending matters, and the accused did not retain a vested right to continue before the Magistrate or to insist on the earlier elected forum.

Conclusion: The Court of Sessions is the normal trial forum under the Official Secrets Act, 1923, and the impugned withdrawal of special empowerment validly shifted pending matters from the Metropolitan Magistrate to the Court of Sessions.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a special penal statute uses a general exclusionary form with a carved-out exception for specially empowered magistrates, the ordinary jurisdiction lies with the superior court indicated by the statute, and special empowerment of a magistrate is only an exception that may be withdrawn with effect on pending proceedings.

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