RAJENDRO NATH MUKERJI Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal against an order of the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad made on January 4, 1896, whereby it was ordered that the appellant's name should be struck off the roll of vakils entitled to practise before the said Court and his certificate should be cancelled.

(2.) ON August 9, 1895, the appellant was found guilty by the Sessions Judge of Allahabad, concurring with the assessors under Section 471 of the Indian Penal Code, of fraudulently using as genuine a document which he knew to be forged, and sentenced to be rigorously imprisoned for three years. He appealed to the High Court, by which, on November 21,1895, the conviction was affirmed and the sentence altered to two years' rigorous imprisonment. On November 27,1895, the High Court ordered notice to be given to the appellant to show cause why he should not be removed from the roll of vakils and his certificate be cancelled in consequence of the offence of which he had been convicted. On January 3,1896, the case came before the Chief Justice and five judges of the High Court, and it was held that the propriety in law or in fact of the conviction could not be questioned, but the counsel for the appellant was not precluded from showing if he could that the conduct of his client in the matter was not such as to render him an unfit person to be retained on the roll of the vakils of the Court. On the next day the same judges in their judgment, after stating the circumstances connected with the offence, said that the appellant had attempted to deceive the Court by representing by means of a forged indorsement on a copy of a decree that an appeal was within time, when he knew, or must have known, that it was time-barred; that this offence was not committed by an ignorant man or by a new practitioner unaccustomed to the examination of documents, nor in the hurry of the moment and without due consideration, and made the order now appealed against.

(3.) THIS ought not to be allowed. In effect the appellant would indirectly have an appeal against the conviction when, if he had petitioned for leave to appeal against it, the leave would certainly have been refused: Ex parte Macrea, (1893) L.R. 20 Ind. Ap. 90 Mr. Branson, who appeared for the appellant, admitted that if this review of the conviction was not allowed there were no extenuating circumstances that he could rely upon against the order. He referred to In re Weave. [1893] 2 Q.B. 439 In that case a solicitor had been convicted by two justices of Bristol of being a party to the continued use of premises as a brothel and sentenced to a term of imprisonment, which sentence was on appeal to the quarter sessions set aside and a fine of 20/ substituted.