The District and Sessions Judge, acting as a judicial authority under Section 6-C of the Essential Commodities Act, functions as a Court and not as persona designata. The Additional Sessions Judge, when exercising jurisdiction under Section 6-C, acts as a Criminal Appellate Court with all its attributes and incidents. The District and Sessions Judge, as a judicial authority under Section 6-C, has the power to make over appeals preferred under Section 6-C to the Additional Sessions Judge for disposal, and the Additional Sessions Judge has the jurisdiction to hear and dispose of such appeals.

( 1 ) THESE two petitions are directed against the orders passed by the district and Sessions Judge, West godavarl at Eluru before whom appeals were preferred under Section 6-C of the essential Commodities Act (hereinafter referred to as the Act) making over criminal Appeal Nos. 65/1974 and 84/ 1974 from his file to the file of the additional Sessions judge, Eluru.

( 2 ) ACCORDING to the petitioner, the learned Additional Sessions Judge Is not competent to hear and dispose of the appeals under Section 6-C of the Act, he, therefore, requests this Court to retransfer the appeals to the file of the district and Sessions, Judge, Eluru from the file of the Additional Sessions judge.

( 3 ) THE question whether the additional Sessions judge is competent to hear and dispose of the appeals under section 6-C of the Act was decided by our learned brother Chlnnappa Reddy, J,. in L. Ramayya vs. State of Andhra Pradesh (I) 1972-1 An. W. R. 118. The learned judge held that whether the District and Sessions Judge acts as a Court or persona deslgnata, the Additional Sessions judge Is Incompetent to hear an appeal preferred to the District and Sessions judge under Section 6-C of the Act. This decision holds the field all the while.

( 4 ) RECENTLY the Full Bench of this. Court held In Public Prosecutor vs l. Ramayya (2) 1974-11 A. P. L. J, 305 that the District and Sessions judge acting under section 6-C of the Essential commodities Act as the judicial authority acts as a Court and not as a persona designata that where, by the statute, matters are referred to the determination of an authority acting In a judicial manner with no further provision, the necessary implication is that the Court will determine the matters as a Court that Its jurisdiction is enlarged with all the incidents of such jurisdiction, that when the District and sessions judge was appointed as appellate authority It must be taken that the appointment is of Sessions Court, that it is how appeals against the orders of confiscation are filed in the Sessions Court and the appeals are treated as Criminal appeals, that since It is not provided In the Act as to what would become of orders passed in the appeals under Section 6-C the ordinary Incidents of the procedure of the Sessions Court would attach to those orders and that the orders passed in an appeal under Section 6-C of the Act by the Sessions Court would be liable to revision.

( 5 ) IN the light of the Full Bench decision, can it still be said that the additional Sessions judge is not competent to hear and dispose of the appeals preferred under Section 6-C of the Act. This question came up for consideration before Ramachandra Raju, J. , (one of us) while considering these two petitions the learned Judge has felt that this question requires consideration of a Division bench as he thinks that in view of the full Bench decision and in view of section 381 cr. P. C. and section 6 C of the essential COMMODITIES ACT, 1955, there is nothing, prima facie, to prohibit the additional Sessions judge from hearing the appeals preferred under Section 6-C of the Act, when they are made over to him by the Sessions Judge.

( 6 ) WHEN "the District and Sessions judge who is the judicial authority appointed under Section 6-C of the Act to hear appeals against the orders of confiscation under Section 6-A acts as a court and not as a persona designata as held by the Full Bench, the necessary implication, therefore, is that such a court will determine the matters as a court and its jurisdiction is enlarged with all the Incidents of such jurisdiction. If Section 381 Cr. P. C. Is attracted to the appeals filed before the Sessions judge under Section 6-C of the Act, then the Sessions Judge has the power to make over the appeals preferred to him under Section 6-C of the Act and the additional Sessions judge will have the power to hear and dispose of the same. If provision Is made under Sec. 381 Cr. P. C. as to how an appeal preferred to a c