THAKUR SHAH Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal against a conviction for abetment of forgery under S. 466 combined with S. 109, Penal Code. The appellant was charged with abetting one Jagannath Singh and one Matuk Chandra Das in forging a certain decree sheet and compromise petition, which are court records and was found guilty by the Sessions Judge of the Santal Parganas. This conviction was upheld by the High Court at Patna. The history of the case has been fully and accurately stated in the judgment of Chatterji J. in the High Court and need not be repeated at length here. It is only necessary to set out sufficient facts to make this judgment comprehensible. In 1934, the appellant, one Buchai, and his son Khudi were parties to a suit for the partition of their joint family property, a suit which was eventually compromised. In order to effect their purpose the parties on 13th December 1935, filed a compromise petition in accordance with which a decree of the Court was drawn up and signed on the 23 of the same month. It is common ground that a certain plot of land situate in Jasidih Bazar and numbered 67 was not part of the joint family property but was purchased by Khudi during the pendency of the suit, and that a registered sale deed assigning the property to him was drawn up dated 22nd January 1935. This plot therefore was not included in the compromise petition or the decree : it was and remained in the possession of Khudi in the sense that he received rent from its tenants.

(2.) By an interpolation in each document this piece of property has now been added to the share assigned to Thakur in both the petition and decree. The prosecution case was and is that the appellant procured this insertion in these two places and abetted the forgery. By the charge they asserted and in evidence they sought to prove that the forgery was carried out as to the decree sheet by Jagannath abetted by Matuk and as to the petition by Matuk abetted by Jagannath. The appellant was accused of abetting both these persons in the offence of forging the two documents. Direct evidence of the commission of the substantive offence by Jagannath and Matuk was given by one Chandrama Singh whose story was to some extent corroborated and was accepted by the Sessions Judge in spite of the view that the witness must be regarded as an accomplice. The High Court also thought him to be in the position of an accomplice but contrary to the view of the trial Judge thought him to be insufficiently corroborated to justify a conviction for forgery against either of the two persons accused of that crime. Accordingly the High Court acquitted Matuk and Jagannath of the crime of forgery. Nevertheless they went on to consider whether the facts established would justify a conviction of each of the three accused for abetment of forgery and held : (1) that those facts were not sufficient to prove beyond reasonable doubt that Matuk was guilty, but (2) were sufficient to incriminate the appellant and Jagannath, whose convictions of abetment were accordingly upheld. A further co-accused, one Jai Prasad Misra, who had been convicted by the Sessions Judge, was acquitted on all charges and their Lordships are not concerned with his case.

(3.) Jagannath has not appealed and in their Lordships' view there was ample evidence to convict him of abetting a person or persons unknown in committing either of the forgeries charged, provided it was permissible for the Court so to charge and convict him. Similarly their Lordships in agreement with the High Court of Patna consider that the evidence establishes the commission of the crime of forgery by some person or persons and its abetment by the appellant. They need only refer to the following facts proved in evidence. Two copies of the original decree had been obtained before the alteration took place. If these copies had been compared with the altered version it would have been clear that a forgery had been committed. One had been issued to Khudi. This copy was obtained from Khudi by the appellant by means of a palpable trick. The second had been lodged by the appellant with the Post Office Savings Bank in order to establish his claim to some money which his father had deposited there. This document he was diligent and urgent to have returned to him and he finally obtained it back on 5 May 1938, with the result that the only two copies extent of the decree in its original form had reached the hands of the appellant. Meanwhile, having obtained a copy of the sale deed of plot 67 on 31 March 1938, he on 11 April applied in the landlord's office for mutation of his name for that of the original owner, using on this occasion a copy of the forged compromise petition. Having succeeded in effecting this object, he attempted to take possession of the plot and on the same day tried to bribe the Bench Clerk of the Court at Deoghar where the decree was written to say that the whole of the decree including the words interpolated were in his handwriting. Finally it was clear that there was no one other than the appellant who could have had any motive for desiring the insertion of the extra piece of land amongst those given to the appellant under the decree.