- (1.) THIS is a defendant's revision application under the Rajasthan Small Cause court Ordinance. The case of the plaintiff is that the defen-dant borrowed Rs. 470/- from him on 13-10-64 and executed a pronote Ex. 1. As he did not make payment despite repeated demands, the present suit was instituted,
(2.) IN support of his case the plaintiff himself came into the witness box and proved the promissory note Ex. I. The defendant denied having executed it and produced a hand-writing expert who corroborated him. The de-fendant did not admit his signatures on the vakalatnama which he had himself filed in Court. The learned trial Judge compared the signatures of the defendant on the promissory note with those on his written statement and the Vakalatnama. and disagreed with the evidence of the expert that the formation of the letters was dissimilar. He came to the conclusion that the formation of the letters was similar, although, the defendant had deliberately disguised his hand-writing by putting the 'matra' of 'big' on the Vakalatnama. written statement and the specimen signatures, whereas, in his signatures on the promissory note he had put the 'matra' of 'small'. He accordingly decreed the suit.
(3.) ON behalf of the defendant, the decision of a learned single Judge of the allahabad High Court in Bhagwan Din v. Gouri Shankar AIR 1957 All 119, has been referred to. In that decision, it has been held that if the de-fendant chooses to deny his signatures on a document then the bare statement of the plaintiff on the point cannot be believed and that the plaintiff must, in such a case, examine a hand writing expert. With all respect to the learned Judge, I am unable to agree with the view taken by him. Section 73 of the Evidence Act permits the Court to com- pare the signature of a person with his admitted signatures. It runs as follows :- "73. In order to ascertain whether a signature, writing or seal is that of the person by whom it purports to have been written or made, any signature, writing or seal admitted or proved to the satisfaction of the court to have been written or made by that person may be compared with the one which is to be proved, although that signature, writing or seal has not been produced or proved for any other purpose. The Court may direct any person present in Court to write any words or figures for the purpose of enabling the Court to compare the words or figures so written with any words or figures alleged to have been written by such person. (This section applies also, with any necessary modifications to finger impressions.)" Under Section 3 of the Evidence Act, "a fact is said to be proved when, after considering the matters before it, the Court either believes it to exist, or considers its existence so probable that a prudent man ought, under the circumstances of the particular case, to act upon the supposition that it exists. ";