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Criminal Revision No. 443 of 1963, decided on 3rd July 1968.

Ss. 107 & 514‑Bond to keep peace‑Forfeiture‑Penalty on account of breach of terms and conditions of bond‑Both principal and surety liable simul taneously and independently.

Unlike an administrative bond with sureties, got executed with the object of securing payment of money and avoidance of pecuniary loss, the object of a bond executed under section 107, Cr. P. C. was not to ensure the recovery of the forfeited amount, but to offer an additional security for the principal to keep the peace.

Sardar Khan v. Crown I L R 17 Lah. 523 rel.

Nemo for Petitioners.

Major Waheed‑ud‑Din Virk for A.‑G. for the State.

Date of hearing : 3rd July 1968.

This Criminal Revision was admitted to examine the limited question, whether in the event of the breach of the terms and conditions of a bond executed under section 107 of the Criminal Procedure Code, both by a principal as also his sureties to keep the peace, both of them would be liable to the forfeiture of the amount or the liability would be shifted only on one of them in the discretion of the Court.

2. The brief facts of the case are that two persons, Sher and Lal, Gujars of village Fatehgarh, Tehsil Kharian of Gujrat District were bound down under section 107/151, Cr. P. Code to keep the peace of one year being ordered to execute a bond for Rs. 1,000 each, with one surety each, is the like amount, by a Magistrate First Class on 21st of March 1961. Muhammad Hussain and Rehmat Khan, respectively, stood sureties for them. A little more than two months thereafter, on 29th of May 1961 both Sher and Lai were sent up under section 325/34, P. P. C., and were sentenced to one year's R. I. each. On appeal the conviction was upheld but the sentence was reduced to that of six months' R. I. Sher and Lai aforesaid having thus been found to have committed the breach of the peace in contravention of the bond executed by them for which Muhammad Hussain and Rahmat had respectively stood sureties for them, proceedings under section 514, Cr. P. Code were initiated against them. Having shown cause in response to a notice Lai and Sher the two principals as also Muhammad Hussain and Rehmat the two sureties were ordered to pay a sum of Rs. 500 each as penalty on account of the forfeiture of the bonds executed by them, Having failed in appeal before the District Magistrate on the 13th of May 1963, all the four aforesaid persons filed the present revision petition which was admitted only to examine the limited question whether the forfeiture of bonds should be ordered against the principal or the sureties in the alternative, or simul taneously against both the parties.

3. Nobody has appeared on behalf of the petitioners pre sumably for the reason that their counsel Chaudhri Fazal Elahi who appeared before this Court on 21st of May 1963, has since been elected as Senior Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly of Pakistan.

4. Major Waheed‑ud‑Din, the learned counsel for the State has drawn my attention to Sardar Khan v. Crown (I L R 17 Lah. 523), a Division Bench authority in which their Lordships having reviewed the various authorities on the point, finally held that a simultaneous forfeiture of the personal bond of the principal as also that of the surety bond of the surety could be legitimately ordered under the law. A perusal of this elaborate judgment shows that earlier there was some conflict of opinion on the point between the Lahore High Court and the Calcutta High Court. Their Lordships of the Division Bench adopted the latter view which proceeded on the reasoning that unlike an administrative bond with sureties, got executed with the object of securing payment of money and avoidance of pecuniary loss, the object of a bond executed under section 107, Cr. P. C., was not to ensure the recovery of the forfeited amount, but to offer an additional security for the principal to keep the peace.

5. I am in respectful agreement with this view and hold that both the principals as also the two sureties were independently responsible for the formers keeping the peace within the stipulated period of one year on pain of forfeiture of this bonds and as such the order is unexceptionable.

6. In consequence, the petition fails and is hereby dismissed.

Petition dismissed.

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