JUDGMENT

Knox, J. - This is a reference by the Sessions Judge of Shahjahanpur. The District Magistrate at Shahjahanpur has convicted three persons, prostitutes, of an offence which he considered they have committed u/s 290 of the Indian Penal Code. The evidence against them shows that all three came out on to a public road, and, thinking that a Reserve Inspector of Police, who was passing by, was a soldier, called out to him and solicited him to go back with them. The District Judge before whom the case was taken in an application in criminal revision was doubtful whether an annoyance caused in a public place to a single person could be brought under the definition of a public nuisance, on the ground that it might have been any member of the public to whom the annoyance was caused. He has accordingly submitted the case to this Court u/s 438 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Section 290 renders punishable what are known as public nuisances in the Indian Penal Code. The definition of public nuisance is to be found in Section 268. A person is guilty of a public nuisance when (omitting that part of the section which does not refer to the present case) he does an act which must necessar