(1.) The appellant was tried by a Judge and jury and was convicted of an offence under Section 466, Indian Penal Code, upon the allegation that he being a public servant had falsified a public register kept by himself, to wit, the order sheet of a Debt Settlement Board constituted under the Bengal Agricultural Debtors Act.
(2.) The prosecution case was that the accused was the President of the Kaikala Debt Settlement Board of which there were three other members, and that this board considered an application by Benoy Krishna Chatterji, the complainant in the case, for a settlement of certain debts owing by his grandfather who was then in jail. On 26 October 1941, a settlement was arrived at under the terms of which a debt owing to the Narayanpur Jautha Bank was settled at a sum of Rs. 190 to be paid in certain instalments. This fact was entered in the order sheet of the proceeding on that date by the accused. The final award was read out by the accused on 28 December, that is to say, two months later, but the sum therein mentioned as owing to the Narayanpur Jautha Bank was shown as Rupees 675 also payable in certain instalments. The award was signed by the accused and by the other members of the board. Two members of the board, who have given evidence on behalf of the prosecution, namely, P.W. 1, Panchanan Das, and P.W. 4, Shaik Moniruddin Mondal, have stated that the reading out was done in the presence of the parties. But the complainant Benoy Krishna Chatterji has deposed that he was not present when the award was read out, and that he did not discover the discrepancy between what was stated in the award, namely, that a sum of Rs. 675 was owing to the Jautha Bank, and what was agreed to as the figure at which this particular debt was to be settled in the proceedings which took place on 26 October, that is, a sum of Rs. 180. The order sheet itself shows that in the entry made on that date the figure of the amount relating to this particular debt was overwritten, and it is impossible to determine from an examination of this entry what the original figure was. The figure now there is certainly Rs. 675.
(3.) The evidence upon which the prosecution mainly relied was the testimony of the complainant who insisted that the amount for which this debt was settled on 26 October, was Rs. 190 only and the remaining evidence given in support of this story did not carry the matter any further. The two members of the board who were examined as witnesses could not say for what figure the debt was settled on 26 October. Another witness who was examined by the prosecution was 9 witness 5, Paresh Chandra Dutt, the clerk of the board and he also could not say what sum was agreed to on 26 October. His evidence, however, is that it was the accused who made all the entries in the order sheet that the entire record of the proceedings remained throughout in the custody of the accused, and that nobody else ever had access to that record. This witness further stated that he saw the order sheet on 26th October after the entries had been made, and that at that time there was no overwriting in the document. There was one witness, P.W. 7, Shaik Ahad Bux Mondal, who deposed that he was present at the office of the Debt Settlement Board on 26 October when these proceedings were taking place, having come there in connexion with another case, and that he overheard the discussion regarding the settlement of the debts in which the complainant was interested. This witness stated that he remembered that the debt due to the Jautha Bank was settled for Rs. 190. Here it may at once be stated that the evidence of this witness must be rejected. It is quite incredible that after the lapse of the many months which intervened between 26th October and the date when this witness gave evidence, he could possibly have remembered the particular a figure for which this debt had been settled. He had no interest in these proceedings, and in cross-examination he admitted that it was impossible for him to recall any other figures of debts which were under discussion by the Debt Settlement Board on that date.