1944 (8) TMI 14

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....isonment for one week. The case against him was that on August 12, 1943, a Government Notification in the Finance Department of the Government of Bombay was published in the Bombay Government Gazette, the notification being issued in exercise of the powers conferred on the said Government by Rule 116 of the Defence of India Rules, ordering that every person holding any stock of certain specified food grains should furnish on every Monday to the Director of Civil Supplies (Statistics Section), Secretariat, Bombay, a full and correct statement of the stocks of any of those articles held by him, and that thereafter no such statement as required by the notification was sent by the accused's company to the authority named for the three weeks....

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....ule 119 of the Defence of India Rules, the accused could be deemed to have been duly informed of the said notification. Accordingly he found the applicant guilty and convicted and sentenced him. 2. The point taken on behalf of the applicant in this application is that there is no evidence as to the manner which in the opinion of the issuing authority was best adapted for informing the persons whom the notification concerned, and that being so, no presumption could arise under Rule 119(1) that the accused was duly informed of the said notification. Sub-rule (2) of Rule 119, so far as material, reads thus: Save as otherwise expressly provided in these Rules, every authority, officer or person who makes any order in writing in pursuance of ....

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....nner the publication, was decided upon, it would not be entitled to the presumption regarding notice to the accused mentioned in the last part of Sub-rule (1). If it was shown that the issuing authority had in this instance decided that the notification in question was to be published only in the Bombay Government Gazette and that such publication was best adapted for informing the persons concerned by the notification, such publication, though obviously inadequate, would give rise to the presumption that the accused had been duly informed of the notification. There is, however, an entire absence of evidence as to how in the opinion of the authority issuing the notification, the notification was to be published. We do not think that in a ca....