The presumption under S.7 of the Press and Registration of Books Act is rebuttable, and someone other than the editor can be held responsible for selecting the published matter.

1. Leave granted.

2. Common questions of law arise in these appeals; hence they are being disposed of by this common judgment. Appellants are either Managing Editor, Chief Editor or Resident Editor of their respective newspaper publications. Separate criminal complaints were filed against the appellants alleging that in their newspaper publications, libellous matter was published and that these appellants had knowledge and they were responsible for such publication and thus they committed the offence of defamation besides other allied offences. In all these cases, the Magistrate had taken cognizance of the offences and issued summons to these appellants. The appellants challenged their prosecution and contended that in view of S.7 of the Press and Registration of Books Act, 1867 (hereinafter referred to as "the Act"), they are not liable to be prosecuted and that the editor of the newspaper whose name is printed on it as the "editor" of that publication alone is liable to be prosecuted for any of the offence for such libellous publication.

3. The appellant in Criminal Appeal No. 701 of 1998 is the Chief Editor of "Malayala Manorama", a daily having wide circulation in Kerala and other places. According to the appellant in this case, he is the Chief Editor of the "Malayala Manorama" and that there is also an editor for this publication who alone can be charged for the offence under S.500 of Indian Penal Code in view of the statutory presumption under S.7 of the Act.

4. In criminal appeal arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 399 of 2001, the appellant is the Managing Editor of Indian Express, Jansatta and Financial Express and certain other publications. A criminal complaint was filed against the appellant and others alleging that on 21st January, 1992 a news item was published in "Jansatta" which, according to the complainant, was defamatory and thus the appellant had committed the offence under S.500 IPC. The complaint was filed before the Judicial Magistrate, Kota in Rajasthan.

5. The appellant in the criminal appeal arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 520 of 2000 was the resident editor of a daily, namely, "Hindustan", and the complainant therein alleged that some articles published on 7.12.1986 and 8.12.1986 in that newspaper ("Hindustan") were defamatory and thereby the appellant committed offence under S.500 IPC.

6. In all these cases, the respective Magistrate took cognizance of the offence alleged in the complaint and issued process to the appellants and the appellants filed petitions under S.482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure for quashing the proceedings on the ground that they are not liable to be prosecuted for the offence of defamation for the alleged libellous publication as they are not the editors of such publications. The plea raised by the appellants was not accepted by the High Courts and the impugned orders passed in those proceedings are challenged before us.

7. We have heard learned counsel for the appellants as well as counsel for the respondents. As noticed earlier, the contention of the appellants is that in view of S.7 of the Act, there cannot be any prima facie case against the appellants and the editor whose name is printed in such publications alone can be prosecuted.

8. S.7 of the Press & Registration of Books Act, 1867 reads as follows:

7. Office copy of declaration to be prima facie evidence.- In any legal proceeding whatever, civil as well as criminal, the production of a copy of such declaration as is aforesaid, attested by the seal of some court empowered by this Act to have the custody of such declarations, or in the case of the editor, a copy of the newspaper containing his name printed on it as that of the editor shall be held (unless the contrary be proved) to be sufficient evidence, as against the person whose name shall be subscribed to such declaration, or printed on such newspaper, as the case may be, that the said person was printer or publisher, or printer and publisher (according to the wo