JUDGMENT
Hashim Yeop A Sani J:
[1] On March 16, 1976, the Public Prosecutor purporting to exercise his power under s 418A of the Criminal Procedure Code issued a certificate requiring the Sessions Court, Lumut to remove Warrant Case SC 21/76 and sixteen other cases involving the same accused, a Member of Parliament, then pending before the said Sessions Court to the High Court, Ipoh. In all the cases the accused is charged under s 4(c) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1961. The accused is now challenging the validity of the aforesaid s 418A and the certificate purporting to be issued under it as infringing art 8(1) of the Federal Constitution. The question for decision is therefore whether s 418A of the Criminal Procedure Code as inserted by Act A324 of 1976 is in violation of art 8 of our Constitution relating to equality before the law and equal protection of the law and therefore void.
[2]
Section 418A in short provides that notwithstanding the provisions of s 417 of the Criminal Procedure Code relating to the power of the High Court to transfer cases to itself or to another subordinate Court the Public Prosecutor, exercising his power personally, may in any particular case tri able by a criminal Court subordinate to the High Court issue a certificate requiring the subordinate Court before which the case is pending to remove it to the High Court at such place as may be specified in the certificate. Upon receipt of the certificate aforesaid the subordinate Court shall without holding a preliminary enquiry cause the accused person to appear or to be brought before such High Court as soon as may be practicable.
[3]
Article 8(1) of the Constitution states that "All persons are equal before the law and entitled to the equal protection of the law." We are not concerned here with the exceptions provided in the other clauses. This article embodies a concept which is familiar in democratic constitutions. It is in fact an old concept originating probably in the 40th Article of MagnaCarta ("to none will we sell, to none will we deny, to none will we delay right or justice"). This concept subsequently found expression in the forerunner of democratic constitutions - the US Constitution, in the last part of the Fourteenth Amendment which states that "No State shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." More recent constitutions also carried this concept for example the Indian Constitution in its art 14 and the Pakistan Constitution in its art 4. The Fourteenth Amendment in the US Constitution is reflected in a number of articles in the Indian Constitution. Although the Fourteenth Amendment does not contain the phrase "equality before the law" as in the Indian Constitution there is in fact no significant difference as a result. As tautological as both the Indian and the Pakistan provisions our Merdeka Constitution also emerged with the provision of art 8(1) which provision was carried in toto into the Malaysian Constitution today.
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[4] The dominant idea in both the expressions "equal before the law" and "equal protection of the law" is that of equal justice. The meaning of these two expressions have been decided in a number of decisions of the US Supreme Courts and also the Indian Supreme Courts and certain principles have been settled and accepted. Due to the demands caused by the complexity of modern government the doctrine of classification was evolved by the courts for practical purposes and read into the equality provisions. It has been accepted therefore that a legislature for the purpose of dealing with the complex problems arising out of an infinite variety of human relations cannot but proceed upon some sort of selection or classification of persons upon whom the legislation is to operate. In Charanjit Lal Chowdhury v. Union of India AIR [1951] SC 41 Mukherjea J said:-
"It must be admitted that the guarantee against the denial of equal protection of law does not mean that ident
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