A criminal Court may be constituted as a Court designata and civil jurisdiction may be conferred upon that Court. If a criminal Court exercises that jurisdiction, then it is not necessarily an inferior Criminal Court within the meaning of the Criminal Procedure Code; and if a right of revision is given from a decision of such a Court, then that revisional application is civil in its character and not criminal.

CHAGLA, C.J. :- The question that arises for the determination of this Full Bench is whether an application in revision made against an order of a Magisterial under S. 110, Bombay Municipal Boroughs Act, XVIII [18] of 1925, lies on the civil or criminal side of this Court ?

2. The Bombay Municipal Boroughs Act constitutes a special appellate Court in respect of the decisions given under S. 104 of that Act; and these appellate Courts, as far as Greater Bombay is concerned, are Magistrates or Benches of Magistrates to be designated by the Chief Presidency Magistrate, and the decisions of the appellate authority under S. 110 of the Act are made subject to revision by the Courts to which appeals against their decisions ordinarily He. Now the contention put forward is that inasmuch as the decision is given by a Magistrate under S. 110 and an appeal from the Magistrates decision lies to the High Court on its criminal side, the order of the Magistrate should be revised by the High Court on its criminal side and not on its civil side. It is further urged that a Magistrates Court is a subordinate criminal Court within the meaning of S. 435. Criminal P.C., and therefore, a revision application against his decision would lie under that section.

3. In our opinion, it is unnecessary to consider whether a revisional application would lie under S. 435 from a decision of a Magistrate under S. 110, Bombay Municipal Boroughs Act, (Bom Act XVIII (18 of 1925). In exercising our revisional power, we are not exercising the jurisdiction conferred upon us under S. 435, Criminal P.C. We are exercising a special jurisdiction which is conferred upon us under S. 110, Bombay Municipal Boroughs Act of 1925. Therefore, the only question that we have to consider is whether in exercising that special jurisdiction under S. 111 we should exercise it on the civil side or the criminal side. Now it cannot be disputed that the subject-matter of the decision of the Magistrate is a purely civil matter. He is dealing with rates and taxes. He is not exercising any criminal jurisdiction not is he dealing with any criminal matter. Therefore, when the matter comes before us in revision, it is a matter which is civil in its nature; and we see no reason why such a matter should be entertained on the criminal side of the High Court and not on the civil side.

4. Various decisions were cited at the bar, and I shall briefly consider them. But as I shall point out those decisions were more concerned with deciding whether a matter lay in revision under S. 435, Criminal P.C. or under S. 115, Civil P.C. In all these cases no special jurisdiction was conferred upon the High Court, and, therefore, the High Court had to determine the nature and extent of its revisional jurisdiction; and in order to determine that the learned Judges who decided those cases had to consider whether the applications lay under S. 435, Criminal P.C., or under S. 115, Civil P.C. The decision which has been now accepted as laying down the correct principle and which had been followed in several decisions of this Court is to be found in Lokmanya Mills, Ltd. v. Municipal Borough, Barsi, 41 Bom LR 937 : (AIR (26) 1939 Bom 477). In that case the decision under S. 110 was given by the First Class Magistrate, Barsi, and a revision under S. 111 lay to the Sessions Court. The question then arose as to whether any re visional application lay from the decision of the Sessions Court, and Sir John Beaumont, sitting with N.J. Wadia, J. held that a revisional application lay under S. 115, Civil P.C.; and in coming to that conclusion the learned Chief Justice observed that "the question of liability to tax is a purely civil matter, and the Magistrate hearing an appeal against a demand notice is a criminal court, so that an appeal lies from him to the Sessions Court, and not to the District Court, and revision lies from the Sessions Court to the High Court as a civil revisional application."

The learned Chief Justice ap