STATE OF GUJARAT Vs. AMBALAL MAGANLAL SHAH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal from an acquittal. The main argument advanced by the learned Government Pleader in support of his appeal is that the respondent in his compromise which was filed in the High Court in another matter admitted that there was no truth in the complaint made by him. It is therefore submitted that his acquittal under sec. 211 of the Indian Penal Code was wrong. That compromise was proved by a certain field copy. His further contention is that the compromise is a public document because it was produced in a Criminal Revisional Court and also because the Revisional Court took that compromise as one of the reasons of its judgment for reducing the sentence. It is contended that the compromise became a part of the record of the Court and that therefore it is a public document. Before the compromise was presented in the Court it was an act of the parties. It was therefore a private document. A private document does not become a public document simply because it is filed in the Court. To be a public document it should be a record of the act of a public officer or Court. There is a distinction between the record of the act of the Court and the record of the Court. A document which forms part of the record of the Court does not necessarily form record of the act of the Court. It may be that upon a private document which is a record of the act of private parties a second act is done by the public officer or by the Court namely filing the document or putting a number on the document. Only that portion of the document which records the act of the Court in filing the document would be a public document. Therefore that part of the document namely the original part would be a private document forming the record of the act of the private parties and what is subsequently added to that document by the Court would be a public document. In East India Trading Co. v. Badat and Co. A. I. R. 1659 Bombay 414 upon which the learned advocate for the respondent placed reliance at page 419 an award presented in the Court and upon which a judgment was pronounced was held not a public document and with great respect rightly so. I therefore hold that the compromise of the private parties which is filed in the Criminal Court. is not a public document and cannot be proved by a certified copy. It should therefore be excluded from consideration. It is conceded by the learned Government Pleader that if that is excluded there is no case for setting aside the acquittal.

(2.) I therefore dismiss the appeal. Appeal dismissed.