A law for the maintenance of public order, including preventive detention and externment of individuals, is governed by different principles than laws involving restrictions on trade and business under Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution.

S.C.Misra, J.

1. These are seven applications in revision against the conviction of the petitioners on various dates in different parts of the State of Bihar for violation of the provisions of Section 9 (2) of the Bihar Maintenance of Public Order Act, 1949 (Bihar Act III of 1950 hereinafter called "the Act") for which they were proceeded against under Sub-section (5) of Section 9 of the Act. The learned Magistrate in each case passed appropriate sentence upon the petitioners. They appealed against the convictions and sentences and their appeals were dismissed on the point of their convictions, but certain modifications were made in some instances with regard to the sentence. The petitioners have come up to this Court seeking a revision of the orders and for setting aside the convictions and sentences concerned. All the applications involve, apart from the few individual points, a common question of the validity of Sub-section (2) of Section 9 of the Act as also the notification issued by the Government of Bihar, in pursuance of Sub-section (2) of Section 9, being notification No. A/A/204/51-C-8006, dated 29-6-1951. According to the learned counsel for the petitioners, the individual question for consideration would be the adequacy of the finding recorded by the Courts below as to whether what the petitioners concerned participated in was merely a procession or a public procession and, if the finding merely amounted to their participation in a procession and not necessarily in a public procession, whether the convictions of the petitioners on such finding would be sustainable.

2. Mr. B. C. Ghose, who appears in support of the applications in Criminal Revision Nos. 119 of 1954, 169 of 1956, 183 of 1956 and 838 of 1957, has referred to a number of decisions of the Supreme Court as also of this Court and other High Courts in support of his contention that Sub-section (2) of Section 9 of the Act as also the notification referred to above must be held to be invalid in view of the provisions of Arts. 14 and 19 of the Constitution of India. He has referred to the case of Dwarka Prasad Laxmi Narain V/s. State of Uttar Pradesh, AIR 1954 SC 224. That case relates to the validity of the Uttar Pradesh Coal Control Order, 1953, Clauses 4(3) and 7 and 8. According to the provisions of that Order, unrestricted power had been given to the State Controller to restrict trade in coal to persons who held a licence from the Coal Controller. Their Lordships of the Supreme Court held that this amounted to imposing an unreasonable restriction upon the freedom of business and trade guaranteed under Article 19 (1) (g) of the Constitution and did not come within the protection of Clause (6) of the Article. Mr. B. C. Ghose has relied upon the principle of that case in support of his contention that in the present instance also the Legislature has conferred unrestricted power upon the State Govvernment or upon the authority to be designated by that Government for prohibiting public processions. The power conferred is thus unreasonable and arbitrary. There is no check upon the discretion of the authority issuing a licence to allow a public procession to be taken out, nor is these any procedure provided for obtaining a redress. He has referred in this connection, in particular, to the following observation in that judgment:

"No rules have been framed and no directions given on these matters to regulate or guide the discretion of the licensing officer. Practically the Order commits to the unrestrained will of a single individual the power to grant, withhold or cancel licences in any way he chooses and there is nothing in the Order which could ensure a proper execution of the power or operate as, a check upon injustice that might result from improper execution of the same. Mr. Umrigar contends that a sufficient safeguard has been provided against any abuse of power by reason of the fact that the licensing authority has got to record reasoas for what h