§ MR. CAINEI beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for India if the attention of the Secretary of State has been called to the decision of Justices Trevelyan and Rampini in the Criminal Appeal Court at Calcutta last November, in the case known as the Noakhali murder case, in which two men were sentenced to be hanged and two others to transportation for life; and if he is aware that the Sessions Judge of Noakhali convicted on the un-corroborated evidence of an approver, and that the High Court Judges in their decision stated that they thought it exceedingly dangerous to act upon evidence of this description, discharging two of the prisoners altogether, and commuting the sentence of death on the other two to transportation; and, if so, will he order a public inquiry into the conduct of this case by the Noakhali Sessions Judge?
* MR. GEORGE RUSSELLThe Secretary of State knows nothing of the 1336 case in question, but he will ask the Government of India about it.
§ MR. CAINEIn consequence of the extremely insufficient and unsatisfactory replies I have received to these questions, I wish to give notice that as early as possible in the next Session I shall move a Resolution declaring that, in the opinion of the House, the administration of criminal justice in the remoter parts of India by District Magistrates and the Sessional Judges is such as to bring the law into contempt and make it a terror to the law-abiding, and that the subject should be promptly inquired into by a committee of experts in Indian Criminal Law, of which one-half should consist of natives of India.