The interpretation of key legal provisions such as the definition of 'market' and the meaning of 'new' in Section 170 of the Local Boards Act influenced the court's decision.

Wallace, J.

1. this is an appeal against an acquittal of the accused in C.C. 305 of 1923 on the file of the Second Class Magistrate, Ponnani. The accused was charged for an offence under Section 170 of the Local Boards Act (XIV) of 1920 with keeping open a new private market. The Trying Court convicted him. The lower Appellate Court reversed the conviction and acquitted the accused, and Government have appealed against the acquittal.

2. The Taluk Board, Ponnani, has lately opened a public day market for the sale of arecanuts in Chalisseri Town. It is contended that accused keeps a private day market for the same purpose which is not licensed by the Taluk Board. This market was being held admittedly before the Taluk Board opened its market, and, when that was opened, the President issued a notice to the accused to show cause against prosecution for keeping an unlicensed market to which the accused replied that he has not been keeping any market at all.

3. The Local Boards Act does not define the term "market," but in this case I do not think that presents any difficulty. A market is a place set apart for the meeting of the general public of buyers and sellers freely open to any such, to assemble together, where any seller may expose his goods for sale and any buyer may purchase. The notification of the Taluk Board is Ex. E. It states that an arecanut day market is established "for the sale of arecanuts" and directs that in future, all arecanuts brought for sale shall be taken to the said market only and sold there. The first point that the prosecution has to prove, therefore, is that in the accuseds so called private market, arecanuts are being brought for sale and sold, so as to constitute an act of interference with, or in the English legal phrase, a "disturbance," of the public market.

4. I shall for convenience sake at present call the premises by the name of the accuseds kada without considering if he is the owner thereof or not, a point on which the accused has put forward a case that he is not the owner. P.W. No. 1, a member of the Taluk Board, states that 200 people gather in the accuseds kada for sale and purchase and that he has seen "the accused and his men collecting foes" presumably on the sales. He was deputed by the President of the Taluk Board to make a report about this unauthorised market. He admits that at the time of his visit the accused was not present and that he cannot say who "the accuseds men" are, and that as to the sort of fees collected his information is pure hearsay. His report, Ex. C, implies that the accused was present when he made his enquiry but does not say that he saw any selling of arecanut going on. P.W. No. 2 is another member of the Board. He also enquired and made a report. He says that many go to the accuseds kada for selling and buying and that fees are being levied. The accused was not there also when he went. He cannot name any one who bought. His report Ex. G, shows that what he saw in the accuseds kada was the weighing of arecanuts; for which a fee was being charged. The weighment was no doubt for purposes of sale. But neither member seems to have seen sales going on in the accuseds kada. Struck with the fact that arecanut brought to the accuseds kada and similar kadas was more than the amount brought to the Taluk Board market, they inferred that these private kadas, are used for exposing the arecanut also for sale. P.W. No. 3 says that these kadas are used for sales and that he himself has sold arecanut at the accuseds kada once after the Taluk Board market was started. P.W. No. 4 states that ha has sold in the accuseds kada twice after the establishment of the public market. P.W. No. 5, not a disinterested witness, says that arecanut is taken for sale to the accuseds kada. D.W. No. 1 professes to have leased the accuseds kada in 1922 and does not say that sales did not take place there. D.W. No. 2 who professes to be a lessee from 1923, says that he used to buy arecanut the