Gujarat High Court
Thakkar Vasudev Kanaiyalal vs S. H. Belim, Additional Registrar on 30 July, 2024
Author: Sunita Agarwal
Bench: Sunita Agarwal
NEUTRAL CITATION
C/LPA/1249/2023 ORDER DATED: 30/07/2024
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IN THE HIGH COURT OF GUJARAT AT AHMEDABAD
R/LETTERS PATENT APPEAL NO. 1249 of 2023
In R/SPECIAL CIVIL APPLICATION NO. 8580 of 2022
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THAKKAR VASUDEV KANAIYALAL
Versus
S. H. BELIM, ADDITIONAL REGISTRAR & ANR.
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Appearance:
PARTY IN PERSON(5000) for the Appellant(s) No. 1
for the Respondent(s) No. 1,2
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CORAM:HONOURABLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE MRS. JUSTICE
SUNITA AGARWAL
and
HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE PRANAV TRIVEDI
Date : 30/07/2024
ORAL ORDER
(PER : HONOURABLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE MRS. JUSTICE SUNITA AGARWAL)
1. Heard Mr. Vasudev Kanaiyalal Thakkar appearing as a party-in-person.
2. This is a wholly misconceived appeal filed by Mr.Vasudev Kanaiyalal Thakar as party-in-person challenging the judgment and order dated 04/08/2023 passed by the learned Single Judge in Special Civil Application No.8580 of 2022, which was directed against an administrative order passed by the Additional Registrar, In-charge of Certified Copy Department of District Court, Vadodara, whereby the Additional Registrar had provided that the certified copies of only exhibited documents of cases could be supplied.
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3. The arguments made by the party-in-person/appellant herein before the learned Single Judge was with reference to the provisions of Section 76 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872.
4. The learned Single Judge has noted the contentions of the learned advocate appearing for the respondent no.1 before the writ court to note that the affidavit-in-reply filed on behalf of respondent no.1 indicated that all the documents which were exhibited have been supplied to the writ applicant. The respondent had scrupulously followed Chapter- XXII more particularly paragraph-'383' of the Criminal Manual and Section 76 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, and passed an order to supply certified copy of the original documents on record which were exhibited. Chapter-XXII, more particularly paragraph-'383' of the Criminal Manual and Section 76 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 read as under:
"Paragraph-383 of the Criminal Manual:-
"383. (i) As soon as the office finds that the application is complete in all respects, it shall, except in case where the application is for supplying certified copy of a document free of costs, which shall be placed before the Presiding Officer for orders, be dealt with by the Register or Clerk of the Court in the Sessions Court as the case may be. Clerk of the Court in the Court of the Civil Judge and Judicial magistrate, the Sheristedar in the the Court of the Metropolitan Magistrate or Senior Page 2 of 6 Downloaded on : Thu Aug 01 21:48:27 IST 2024 NEUTRAL CITATION C/LPA/1249/2023 ORDER DATED: 30/07/2024 undefined Clerk in the Court of the Judicial Magistrate, who may either grant the application or refuse it for reasons to be recorded thereon, or pass such orders as may be deemed just:
Provided, however, that such application shall be dealt with by the junior clerk specially authorised by the Judicial Magistrate, in case no such Senior Clerk is appointed for his Court.
(ii) In case of refusal, such refusal and the grounds for the refusal shall be communicated to the applicant in writing."
Section 76 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872:-
"76. Certified copies of public documents.- Every public officer having the custody of a public document, which any person has a right to inspect, shall give that person on demand a copy of it on payment of the legal fees therefor, together with a certificate written at the foot of such copy that it is a true copy of such document or part thereof, as the case may be, and such certificate shall be dated and subscribed by such officer with his name and his official title, and shall be sealed, whenever such officer is authorized by law to make use of a seal; and such copies so certified shall be called certified copies.
Explanation.- Any officer who, by the ordinary course of Page 3 of 6 Downloaded on : Thu Aug 01 21:48:27 IST 2024 NEUTRAL CITATION C/LPA/1249/2023 ORDER DATED: 30/07/2024 undefined official duty, is authorized to deliver such copies, shall be deemed to have the custody of such documents within the meaning of this section."
5. It was further noted that the copies of the documents produced in the aforesaid matters are the photostat copies of the certified copies of the papers of the lower court, amongst which, some of them are photostat copies of the certified copies of the papers of the lower court, some are photostat copies of the judgments passed by the Apex Court, some are e-mail letters sent to the concerned court by the writ applicant and the citations which are not exhibited. There was, thus, no occasion for providing certified copy of such documents which are essentially the papers of the lower court, judgments of the Apex Court and e-mail letters and citations, which were not required to be exhibited and hence could not have been provided to the petitioner.
6. It is further noted that it was orally informed to the writ applicant to supply ordinary/simple/kachcha copy of which only photocopies are produced on record but the writ applicant had chosen not to do the needful. It was further noted that the certified copies of the exhibited documents have been kept ready to be provided as per the report no.7742 dated 03/02/2022 given in criminal revision namely Cr.RA No.164 of 2021, however the writ applicant had not collected the same. It was also noted that if the writ applicant was to collect the same, the copy would be provided. The learned Single Judge has further noted that there was no Page 4 of 6 Downloaded on : Thu Aug 01 21:48:27 IST 2024 NEUTRAL CITATION C/LPA/1249/2023 ORDER DATED: 30/07/2024 undefined question of providing the certified copies of the photostat copies of orders of the Apex Court as the competent authority would not be in a position to authenticate the documents which were the photostat copies.
7. The order impugned dated 11/02/2022 has been extracted by the learned Single Judge in the judgment impugned, wherein it is noted by the learned Additional Registrar that if any document is a photocopy, then certified copy of the same should not be provided. Moreover, no certified copy shall be issued upon a certified copy and the copies of only those documents which are eligible to be issued to the applicant in which original documents are exhibited in the record. Whereas the applicant could obtain the copies of remaining documents where the original document is produced during the court proceeding. It was, thus, opined by the Additional Registrar that the applicant is eligible to get certified copy of only of the exhibited original documents in the case of Criminal Revision Application No.167 of 2021. It was, thus, ordered that the concerned Copying Clerk shall carry out the procedure to provide the certified copies of only of those original documents to the applicant/writ applicant/appellant herein which have been produced and exhibited in the Criminal Revision Application No.167 of 2021. The application moved by the appellant/writ applicant seeking for certified copies of the documents filed in the Criminal Revision Application had, thus, been partly allowed.
8. For the reasoning given by the learned Single Judge and Page 5 of 6 Downloaded on : Thu Aug 01 21:48:27 IST 2024 NEUTRAL CITATION C/LPA/1249/2023 ORDER DATED: 30/07/2024 undefined the order passed by the Additional Registrar, In-charge of Certified Copy Department of District Court, Vadodara, we do not find any error of law so as to intervene.
The Appeal is dismissed.
(SUNITA AGARWAL, CJ ) (PRANAV TRIVEDI,J) ILA Page 6 of 6 Downloaded on : Thu Aug 01 21:48:27 IST 2024