The protection given by Section 53 of the Madras District Police Act does not extend to acts done by a police officer out of malice.

Venkatasubba Rao, J.

1. This appeal raises an important question, namely, whether in an action for a malicious act against a police officer, he is entitled to raise the defence of limitation, relying upon the protection given by Section 53 of the Madras District Police Act (XXIV of 1859). The plaintiff alleges that the first defendant, a Police Sub-Inspector, accusing him falsely of having obstructed a public pathway by heaping bricks, commenced with a malicious motive a prosecution against him (C.C. No. 318 of 1927) on 18th March, 1927, under Sections 188 and 283, Indian Penal Code, and that two days later (on the 20th March) he maliciously instituted another false complaint (C.C. No. 320 of 1927) under Section 291, Indian Penal Code, in connection with the same alleged heaping of bricks. The plaintiff further alleges that although the earlier complaint was enquired into and dismissed, the second charge, instead of being withdrawn, was pressed and continued, which also was ultimately found to be false. The third defendant is a Circle Inspector, who, it is alleged, came on transfer to the village in question. It was his duty, the plaintiff states, to have withdrawn the second complaint but from improper motives he failed to do so. The second defendant is the Secretary of State for India, against whom also damages have been claimed on the ground that he is liable for the tortious acts of his agents.

2. The suit has been dismissed by the Court below and the plaintiff has preferred the present appeal. So far as the Secretary of State is concerned, the appeal has not been pressed; it fails and is accordingly dismissed with costs.

3. The order of acquittal in respect of the first complaint was made on 26th July, 1927, in respect of the second, on the 21st November of the same year, and the suit was filed on 3rd January, 1929. Under the Limitation Act in regard to actions for malicious prosecution, time runs from the date when the plaintiff is acquitted or the prosecution is otherwise terminated and the period prescribed is one year (Article 23). In this case the plaintiff gave a notice under Section 80 of the Civil Procedure Code, and according to the lower Court, should the case be held to be governed by the Limitation Act, in computing limitation the period of the notice should be excluded, and the learned Government Pleader concedes that this conclusion is right. But even upon this footing the suit, having been brought more than fourteen months from the date of the first acquittal, is out of time, in so far as it relates to the earlier complaint. The appeal to that extent again has not been pressed.

4. Thus, the action is confined to the second prosecution and is pressed only as against defendants 1 and 3. Section 21 of the Madras District Police Act provides inter alia that it shall be the duty of every police officer to use his best endeavours and ability to prevent all crimes, offences and public nuisances; to preserve the peace and to apprehend disorderly and suspicious characters; to detect and bring the offenders to justice. Then the next relevant provision (S. 53) in so far as it applies to the facts of the case, runs as follows:

All actions and prosecutions against any person, which may be lawfully brought for anything done or intended to be done, under the provisions of this Act, or under the general police powers hereby given, shall be commenced within three months after the act complained of shall have been committed, and not otherwise.

5. The question is, whether the protection given by this section extends to acts done by a police officer out of malice. The learned Government Pleader contends that there is nothing to suggest that such acts are excluded and that the words should receive their plain and natural meaning; it should be wrong, he maintains, to construe the section as if the word bona fide occurred before the words done or intended to be done. But the question is, whether upon a true construction of the