Rajasthan High Court - Jaipur
Anil Kumar And Ors vs Shankar Lal And Anr on 26 November, 2010
S.B. Civil Writ Petition No.15511/2010 Anil Kumar and ors. Vs. Shankar Lal Dated : 26.11.2010 HON'BLE MR. MAHESH BHAGWATI,J. Mr. Khalid Mehmood, for the petitioners.
*** By way of this writ petition, the petitioners have beseeched to quash and set aside the order dated 26th October, 2010 whereby the learned Additional Civil Judge (Jr.Div.) No.1, Jaipur District, Jaipur dismissed the application of petitioners filed under Section 65 of Indian Evidence Act, imploring to take the photo-stat copy of one agreement on record.
2. Heard the learned counsel for the petitioners and carefully scanned the impugned order as also the relevant material on record.
3. Learned counsel took me through the judgment of Smt. J.Yashoda Vs. Smt. K.Shobha Rani reported in 2007(2) WLC, 253 and canvassed that the photo-stat copy of any document could be taken on record if the original document was in possession and power of the opposite party. The same has been held by the Hon'ble Apex Court in the afore-cited case. Learned trial Court has thus, committed an error in not following the above judgment in letter and spirit and arbitrarily dismissed the application filed under Section 65 of the Indian Evidence Act.
-2-4. Having reflected over the submissions made by the learned counsel for the petitioners and gone through the judgment of Smt.J.Yashoda (Supra), it is noticed that one photo-stat copy of an agreement was filed before the learned trial Court imploring that the same may be taken on record and admitted to evidence as the original of this document was in possession and power of the plaintiff.
5. A bare perusal of the provisions of Section 65 of Indian Evidence Act reveals that copies made from or compared with the original fall in the category of secondary evidence and if the secondary evidence is placed before the Court that may be admitted to an evidence, but in the instant case the photo-stat copy of the document has been filed, which does not contain any certificate that it was made from the original or compared with the original. In the absence of any certificate on the disputed document, the same could not have been admitted to evidence by the Court. The learned trial Court in the light of the judgment of Smt.J.Yashoda has rightly dismissed the application and further rightly denied to admit the said document (Photostat copy) to evidence.
6. The argument advanced by the learned counsel for the petitioners is found to be totally devoid of substance -3- and the same is not sustainable. E converso, the impugned order is found to be just and proper and suffers from no factual or legal infirmity and to my firm view, warrants no intervention.
7. For the reasons stated above, the writ petition fails and the same being devoid of any merit deserves to be dismissed at the threshold and the same stands dismissed accordingly.
(MAHESH BHAGWATI)J. Pcg item no.10