RAJESWAR BAGCHI AND NRIPATI CHANDRA DAS Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This Rule is directed against the order of the Deputy Magistrate of Rangpur convicting the petitioner of an offence under Section 62(6) of the Stamp Act II of 1899 and sentencing him to pay a fine of Rs. 20.

(2.) It appears that on the 11th Agrahyan 1319, one Arajulla Sheikh applied to an institution, known as the Gaibandha Bank, Limited, for a loan of Rs. 50. The application was made on a prescribed form, which contains columns intended to show the signature of the person recommending the loan or undertaking any responsibility on behalf of the applicant. In that form one Sadat Ali stated that the applicant was a middle class man and gave certain other particulars with regard to him and recommended that he should be granted the loan on a bond. He then added the words in Bengali, "ami adai karia diba", that is to say, I will make the payment or see that the payment is made, in other words, be said "I guarantee the payment." The present petitioner was at that time, and we are informed that he is still, the Manager of the Bank, and in the last column of this form he approves the proposal made by Arajulla and says that this application for a loan of Rs. 50 to carry interest at the rate of Rs. 2-11-0 monthly should be granted, and to this approval he appends his signature. The Magistrate in convicting the petitioner has taken the view that the words. "I guarantee the payment" signed by Sadat Ali represents a completely executed security bond, and that the signature of the Manager found in the last column of the proposal is to be taken as the signature to that security bond appended by way of acceptance thereof.

(3.) We are unable to take this view, and we are also unable to take the view which has been put forward before us by the learned Counsel for the Crown. That view is to the effect that the proposal and the approval of the proposal to be found in column 9 represent a completely executed agreement between the principal borrower and the Manager and that it should, therefore, have borne 8-annas stamp. We are unable to take that view for this reason, that the statements in the proposal made by applicant himself and by the Manager do not represent a completed agreement, more particularly with regard to the rate of interest. Neither the proposed surety nor the applicant said anything regarding interest and there is nothing in the form itself to show that the borrower or the surety agreed to the proposed rate. Thus at most the proposal with the statements made in its various columns represent merely negotiations which were intended to lead up to the execution of a bond and the payment thereon of the sum of Rs. 50.