Judgment

SHAH, J.:- The Assistant Collector of Customs filed a complaint against Ramesh Chandra Mehta and four others in the Court of the Additional District Magistrate, 24 Parganas, charging them with offences under Section 120B Indian Penal Code read with Section 167 (81) of the Sea Customs Act, 1878, Section 5 of the Import and Export Control Act, 1947, and for specific offences committed in pursuance of the conspiracy. It was the case of the complainant that when Mehta was searched on December 13, 1962, at the Dum Dum Airport, Calcutta, diamonds and jewellery worth Rupees 1,91,000/- were found on his persons and currency notes of Rs. 27,000/- were found in a suit-case with him and that pursuant to a statement made by Mehta diamonds, pearls and jewellery of the value of Rs. 2,61,800/- and correspondence, telegrams and cables bearing upon the conspiracy to smuggle gold, precious stones etc., into India form foreign countries were recovered from different places.

2. The complainant tendered in evidence at the trial certain confessional statements which he claimed were made before the Customs Authorities in an enquiry under Section 171-A of the Sea Customs Act, 1878, by Mehta and the other persons accused. Counsel for the accused objected to the admissibility of that evidence but the objection was over-ruled by the Trial Magistrate. The High Court of Calcutta rejected a petition invoking their revisional jurisdiction against the order of the Trial Magistrate. With special leave, Mehta has appealed to this Court.

3. Counsel for Mehta urged three contentions in support of the appeal:

(1) that the statements tendered in evidence by the Customs Officer must be deemed by virtue of Section 160 of the Customs Act 52 of 1962 to be recorded under the provisions of that Act and their admissibility may be adjudged in the light of that Act alone;

(2) that an Officer of Customs is a "police officer" within the meaning of Section 25 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, and a confessional statement made before him is inadmissible in evidence at the trial of the appellant and his co-accused;

(3) that the statements made before the Customs Officer were otherwise inadmissible, because Mehta and others being persons accused of an offence were compelled by the provisions of Section 171-A of the Sea Customs Act, 1878, to be witnesses against themselves within the meaning of Article 20 (3) of the Constitution.

4. By Section 160 (1) of Act 52 of 1962 read with the Schedule to that Act, the Sea Customs Act 8 of 1878 was repealed. By sub-section (3) of Section 160 it is provided:

"Notwithstanding the repeal of any enactment by this section,-

(a) any notification, rule, regulation, order or notice issued or any appointment or declaration made or any licence, permission or exemption granted or any assessment made. Confiscation adjudged or any duty levied or any penalty or fine imposed or any forfeiture, cancellation or discharge of any bond ordered or any other thing done or any "other action taken under any repealed enactment shall, so far as it is not inconsistent with the provisions of this Act, be deemed to have been done or taken under the corresponding provisions of this Act;

(b) x x x x x ."

But the admissibility of statements recorded by a Customs Officer under Section 171-A of the Sea Customs Act 1878, depends upon the determination of the question whether the statements when made were inadmissible under Section 25 of the Evidence Act, and Article 20 (3) of the Constitution. Even after the repeal of the Sea Customs Act, admissibility of the statement made in a complaint made before a Magistrate for contravention of the provisions of that Act must be adjudged in the light of the taint, if any, attaching thereto when the statement was made. The first contention must, therefore, fail.

5. Section 25 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, enacts that "No confession made to a police officer shall be proved as against a persons accused of any offence. The broad ground f