ORDER

Mulla, J. - This is a reference by the learned Additional District Magistrate of Allahabad in a case in which 14 persons have been convicted by a Special Magistrate of the First Class of an offence u/s 379, I.P.C., on the complaint of one Samiullah. The prosecution case was that a certain field had been in the complain, ant's possession for some years and he had sown a mixed crop therein, but during his absence from the village some time on 17th September 1937, the opposite parties out the crop away. In the report of the incident which he made at the Thana on 20th September he charged 23 persons with an offence u/s 379, I.P.C. The delay in the report was explained by him on the ground that it was only when he returned to his village on the evening of 19th September that he came to know what had happened and it was then that he proceeded to the Thana the next day after making some enquiries and ascertaining names of the accused persons from certain witnesses. Besides the complainant, five witnesses were examined on his behalf to prove the fact that the crop in question had been sown by him and had been cut away by the opposite parties in the circumstances alleged by the prosecu