HARI PARPAN VAID Vs. SUMER CHAND JAIN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This revision petition is directed against the order of the trial Court declining the production of secondary evidence.

(2.) By way of application the applicant wanted to produce secondary evidence qua two letters dated the 13.5.1985 and 28.5.1985, one of them was a receipt and the second was a letter in the form of agreement, photostat copy of both these documents have been placed on file. The trial Court after noticing the ruling reported as Amar Chand v. Smt. Kaushalya,1985 2 LLR 46 has held that the applicant could not be given the benefit of his own wrong as he has lost/misplaced the documents himself. In the present case, the counsel for the parties are agreed that without opining as to whether a good case for the leading secondary evidence is made out or not, the case can be remanded for recording the evidence about the loss/misplacement of the documents. In my view, this is the correct approach which can be adopted by the trial Court in the first instance. The trial Court, if it was not satisfied by the mere averment in the application could have allowed an opportunity to the applicant to produce evidence and then decided as to whether the case for secondary evidence is made out or not. In consequence of the agreement and the view which I have taken, this revision petition is allowed to extent that the case is remanded to the trial Court for recording evidence. After the evidence is recorded, the trial Court would finally decide the application for production of secondary evidence. The order to this extent is quashed. The parties through their counsel are directed to appear before the trial Court on 4.4.1990.