A company cannot be held liable for an offence under Section 500 IPC, which requires 'mens rea', and a director of a company cannot be held liable for an offence committed by the company unless it is specifically provided for in law.

( 1 ) THIS Rule must be made absolute. The present revisionsal application is for quashing, in so far as it relates to the petitioner, a criminal case being C. R. Case No. 638 of 1966, pending in the Court of the Additional District Magistrate at Port Blair. Andaman and Nicobar Islands under Section 500 I. P C.

( 2 ) THE facts leading on to the present revisional application may be put in a short compass. On the 14th May 1965 in the issue of the "darpan" a Bengali weekly published In Calcutta, an editorial article was published containing an alleged defamatory imputation against the complainant firm, viz. , R. Akoji Jadwet and Company This weekly used to be printed at a press owned by a Limited company, viz. , the Metropolitan Printing and Publishing House (P) Ltd. and at the relevant time, the present petitioner, Sunilakhya Chowdhury, was one of the Directors of the Company. The accused petitioner was neither the maker, that is the author nor the printer nor the publisher of the impugned publication and has been prosecuted as he is a director of the Company which owns the Press and which did the job of printing the said journal. The opposite party No. 2, Hiren Basu, is the Editor Publisher, Printer and the owner of the said Bengali journal as per the declaration under Rule 3 of the Press and Registration Act.

( 3 ) THE complainant opposite party No. 1 filed a petition of complaint on the 22nd March, 1966 in the Court of the Additional District Magistrate. Port Blair. Andaman and Nicobar Islands against the present petitioner and the accused opposite party No. 3 inter alia on the allegations that the accused persons made, printed and published for public consumption, certain false and highly tendentious remarks in the publication called the "darpan", which is a Bengali Weekly. In its 16th issue dated Friday the 14th May 1965 alleging insinuating and impugning complicity of the complainant and his partners with the alleged loss of 25 trategic from the office of the Chief Commissioner at Port Blair, Andaman and Nicobar Islands. It was further averred therein that the Court at Port Blair has jurisdiction to entertain and try the accused there as the accused had made and published by selling and circulating for sale at Port Blair and Calcutta copies of the Weekly containing the said defamatory matters. No list of the prosecution witnesses, however, was filed along with the petition of complaint.

( 4 ) THE Additional District Magistrate, Port Blair thereupon registered the said complaint and fixed 28-3-60 for the statement of the complainant and on 23-8-60 the complainant being absent the complaint was dismissed for default Thereafter before the said order was signed, the learned Counsel for the complainant appeared and the learned Additional District Magistrate directed the case to be put up in the afternoon when the learned Counsel for the complainant was again busy elsewhere and the case was adjourned till 31-3-66. On 31-3-66 the learned Additional District Magistrate recorded the statement of the complainant and as he was of the opinion that there are good grounds to proceed in the matter, he directed summons to be issued against the accused persons for appearance on 9-5-66. The learned Additional District Magistrate further direct- ed that a list of witneses is to be filed. Thereafter there were several adjournments on the prayer of the present petitioner and the case was ultimately fixed on the 16th August, 1966. The present revisional application was moved before this Court on the 8th August, 1966 and the Rule was issued, staying all further proceedings in the meantime.

( 5 ) IT is to be observed in this connection that the impugned publication is dated the 14th May, 1965 but the petition of complaint was filed so late as on the 22nd March, 1966 but no reason has been given in the said petition of complaint for filing the same after the lapse of over ten months.

( 6 ) THE accused petitioner's-- case,