1983SCMR 616 (PLP)

Date of hearing : 5th March, 1983. ASLAM R1AZ HUSSAIN, J.‑Ghulam Qadir petitioner seeks leave to appeal against the judgment of the Lahore High Court, dated 20‑11‑1979 con victing and sentencing him for offences under sections 465 and 471, P.P.C., in exercise of its suo motu power under section 476, Cr. P. C.

2. The facts leading to the petition are, briefly, that Ghulam Qadir who is a Headmaster of a private school known as Jauhar High School in village Bashira/Chak No. 318/T.D. in the same district, on 1‑4‑1971. A year later on 1‑4‑1972 M. L. R. 118 came into force, which provided for nationali zation of schools, of the said Regulation the petitioner's school was also nationalized by the Provincial Government under the said Regulation. Subsequently, however, it came to light that the petitioner's school was a ficti tious Institution, which did not exist in fact. As a result the Provincial Government denationalised the school vide Notification dated 7‑I1‑1972. It is surprising that while all the owners of the privately managed schools in the country were making desperate efforts that their schools be either not nation alised or should be denationalised, Ghulam Qadir petitioner was aggrieved by the denationalisation of his school and challenged the validity of the aforementioned Notification dated 7‑11‑1972 through a writ petition in the Lahore High Court. The writ petition was, however, dismissed on 4‑7‑1978 by the earned Single Judge of that Court. Still not being satisfied he filed an I.‑C.A. against the dismissal of his writ petition. When the said appeal came up for hearing in motion, the learned Division Bench seized of the appeal asked the petitioner to produce some Proof about school in question to show that the school in question had been in existence for quite some time as asserted by him On 27‑8‑1978, the Petitioner produced a certificate purporting to have been issued by M. S. Multani, Assistant Controller, Board of Secondary School and Intermediate Multan, showing a list of roll numbers of the candidates of his school who appeared in the Secondary School Examination from 1971 to 1978. The signatures on the certificate appeared to be suspicious to the learned Judges required Mr. M. S. Multani, Assistant Controller to appear in person. After examining the said certificate, Mr.Multani stated that the same had not been issued by him. At this stage petitioner's counsel submitted that he did not wish to press the appeal. The appeal was consequently dismissed, but in view of the conduct of the petitioner in filing a forged document before a Court of law the learned Division Bench tried him for offence under section 465/471, P. P. C., after issuing him a notice under section 476, Cr. P. C.

3. At the trial the petitioner pleaded not guilty. He admitted the produc tion of the certificate in question but stated that it was genuine and had, in fact, been issued by Mr. M. S. Multani. Mr. Multani himself appeared as a P. W. and denied having issued the said certificate. His specimen signatures were taken and got compared with the signatures on the certificate through Mr. Qamar Ahmad Bhatti (P. W. 2) Handwriting Expert in the office of the Director Forensic Science Laboratory Lahore. Mr. Qamar Ahmad Bhatti opined that the signatures on the certificate in question were not those of Mr: M. S. Multani and that they were forged. This witness was not even cross-examined by the accused petitioner, nor did he care to produce his own hand writing expert to question the opinion of the Expert produced by the pro secution. He, however, produced four defence witnesses whose testimony was not relied upon by the learned Division Bench of the High Court trying the case for the reasons given in the impugned judgment one of the reasons being that when although it was asserted by some of them that they were present in the office of Mr. Multani when he issued the certificate in question yet he (Mr. Multani) was not asked any question about their presence at the spot, when he appeared as a prosecution witness. The learned Court, therefore, found him guilty under section 471, P. P. C. and sentence him to one year R. I. It is this order that the petitioner has challenged before this Court.

4. We have heard the learned counsel for the petitioner at length. He was unable to point out any flaw in the impugned judgment and instead of being persuaded that Ghulam Qadir (petitioner) was not guilty we feel that he was treated rather leniently by the learned trial Judges because as observed by them at page 3 of the impugned judgment : "

the conduct of the respondent in filing a forged certificate before this Court was of brazen audacity and the interest of justice required that repetition of such conduct should be curbed with a strong hand we issued a notice to him why he should riot be prosecuted." We cannot envisage as to what could have considered a worse case pro ducing a forged document for use as evidence in a Court of law, which would have merited the maximum punishment provided under section 471, P. P. C. As a matter of fact a reading of the statements made at the trial by the accused petitioner as well as by of the deface witnesses produced by him (which were disbelieved by the learned Judge) clearly shows that they had perjured them selves and given false evidence on oath in a Court of law and as such deserved to be tried for the said offences under the relevant sections of the P. P. C. so that it should have bad the deterrent effect mentioned by the learned High Court when issuing him the notice under section 476, Cr. P. C. With the above observations the petition is dismissed. Petition dismissed.