1. These Criminal Revision Petitions arise out of prosecutions for offences under S.27 of the Kerala Forest Act, 1961, (Act 4 of 1962) hereinafter referred to as the Act. A common question of law arises in all these petitions and they are therefore disposed of by a common judgment. S.27 of the Act deals with penalties for trespass or damage in Reserved Forests S.4 to 18 of the Act provide for the determination of the rights in the land which is to be constituted as a Reserved Forest. Then comes S.19 under which the Reserved Forest is eventually constituted. S.19 of the Act is in the following terms:

"When the proceedings prescribed in the preceding sections have been taken, the Government may publish a notification in the Gazette specifying the limits of the forests which it is intended to reserve and declaring the same to be reserved from a date to be fixed by such notification.

From the date so fixed, the forest shall be deemed to be a "Reserved Forest".

2. S.22 of the Act provides that "no right of description shall be acquired in or over a Reserved Forest except under a grant or contract in writing made by or on behalf of the Government or by or on behalf of some perso