(YERNENI) SATYANARAYANA Vs. EMPEROR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal against an order of the District Judge of Kistna under Section 476, Criminal P.C. that a complaint would be made against the appellant. The order, which, so far as the appellant is concerned, consists of two sentences, is in my opinion clearly insufficient. It contains no finding, as required by Section 476, that it is expedient in the interests of justice that an inquiry should be made into the alleged offences nor any suggestion of reasons for such a finding. The order is one subject to appeal, and it is clearly necessary that the finding and the reasons for it should be set out. It is suggested for the Public Prosecutor that these defects in the learned Judge's order are made good by the argumentative complaint which he sent to the Magistrate. I do not agree that such defects in the order can be made good by the complaint, and a discussion of the reasons for the order is obviously out of place in the complaint. I may add that the complaint, though unnecessarily diffuse in. some respects, does not mention the finding that in the interests of justice it is expedient that an inquiry be made, which should have appeared in the order under Section 476. And as a complaint, it is clearly defective. It complains of offences of giving false evidence and fabricating false evidence. It may be gathered, though it has not been specifically stated, that the District Judge intends to complain that the entries, Exs. J-1 and K-1 in O.S. No. 350 of 1926 on the file of the District Munsif of Gudivada, have been fabricated by the appellant with the intention of using them in evidence in that suit. But the District Judge has neither set out in his complaint nor described with sufficient precision the passages in the deposition of the appellant as a witness in that suit which he alleges to have amounted to false evidence. It is fair neither to the Magistrate nor to the appellant that he should make so vague a complaint. The District Judge should have remembered that he was not in the position of an ordinary complainant, whose allegations, if vague, would be reduced by the. Magistrate to precision by oral examination when the complaint was presented.. For that reason and also because the Magistrate could not travel outside the limits of the complaint, so far as the offences of giving and fabricating false evidence were concerned, it was incumbent on the District Judge to make clear and precise allegation in his complaint. In my opinion the complaint is not a proper one, and, even if it were, it could not take the place of a reasoned order containing the finding required by Section 476, Criminal P.C.

(2.) Mr. Ethiraj, who appears for the appellant has raised a further objection to the District Judge's proceedings on the ground that the allegations in the complaint in respect of Exs. J-l and K-l amount to allegations of forgery as well as fabricating false evidence. He points out that the District Judge could not complain against the appellant under Section 476, Criminal P. 0., of forgery, as the appellant, though a witness in the suit, was not a party to it, and that the District Judge did not complain against the appellant of that offence. This does not appear to me to raise any difficulty in the case. If the Magistrate when inquiring into the alleged offences of giving and fabricating false evidence, found that there was evidence that the appellant has committed in the same transaction forgery or any other offence, in respect of which no sanction or complaint of a particular authority or officer is required, he could frame a charge of that offence also. Mr. Ethiraj has drawn my attention to the very recent decision of Curgenven, J. in P. Muthirian V/s. M. Vengu Ayyar A.I.R. 1929 Mad. 21 in which the facts alleged disclosed an offence of forgery and also an offence of fabricating false evidence, that a private complainant could not proceed with a complaint of forgery when no Court had complained of the offence of fabricating false evidence even though the accused persons were not parties to the proceedings in connexion with which the evidence had been fabricated.. But that is very different from the present case. Here there has been no attempt to prosecute the appellant for forgery while evading the necessity to make the Court to make a complaint of fabricating false evidence. If the absence of a complaint of fabricating false evidence made by a Court could be a bar to a prosecution for forgery in the circumstances, there is no such, bar in this case. Curgenven, J's view is that, when the facts alleged disclose more than one offence and for prosecution for one of the offences disclosed a complaint from a Court is necessary, a private party cannot complain of the other offence or offences. Mr. Ethiraj wishes to deduce from that decision a rule that a prosecution must be for all the offences convered by the facts disclosed and that, even when a complaint is from a Court acting under Section 476, Criminal P.C. if it is not in respect of all offences disclosed, it is bad. Then he goes on to contend that the District Judge could under Section 476 make no complaint of forgery against the appellant and therefore that his complaint of giving and fabricating false evidence is not only bad but can never be put right. This is ingenious, but fallacious. Though I may perhaps remark with great respect that at present I feel some doubt about Curgenven, J's decision it certainly does not lead to the absurd result to which Mr. Ethiraj would press it. The actual decision was that a private complaint of forgery should not be entertained if the facts alleged amounted to an offence of fabricating false evidence, of which no Court had complained. That decision does not imply that a Court's complaint of fabricating false evidence should not be entertained unless there is also a complaint of. forgery, if the facts alleged disclose forgery nor that when a Court has properly complained of fabricating false evidence, the trying Magistrate cannot frame a charge of forgery also if the evidence supports it. I see nothing in Mr. Ethiraj's objection that there is no complaint of forgery in this case.

(3.) The last objection raised for the appellant is that on the merits this is not a. case in which he should be prosecuted. Of that I am not persuaded; and I do not. think it advisible at present to say more.