Subramaniam vs The State

M. Karpagavinayagam, J.—Subramaniam, the petitioner herein, who is arrayed as A1, was convicted for the offences under Sections 467,

471 r/w 467, 409 and 477-A I.P.C. and sentenced to undergo R.I. for one year and to pay a fine of Rs. 2,500/- in C.C. No. 191/89 on the file of

the Judicial Magistrate No. 2, Pollachi. On the appeal filed by the petitioner in C.A. No. 83/92 on the file of the learned I Additional Sessions

Judge, Coimbatore, the conviction was confirmed, however, the sentence of imprisonment was modified into fine. Having not satisfied with that,

the petitioner has filed this Revision before this Court challenging the said conviction.

The case of the prosecution is as follows:

The petitioner (A 1) was an Executive Officer in Soolakkal Arulmighu Mariamman Vinayagar Temple during the period between 17.9.80 and

6.4.81. One Arunachalam (A2) and Velliangiri (A3) were working as Accountants in the temple. During the said period, all the accused fabricated

false bills as if various articles were purchased for the temple and by using those bills, they misappropriated the temple funds to the tune of Rs.

2.277-75 after entering false entries in the registers of the temple.

On the side of the prosecution P.Ws.1 to 16 were examined and Exs.P-1 to P-23 were marked.

P.W.2 Ramadoss, P.W.3 Sarangapani, P.W.4 Chandrasekaran and P.W.5 Subramaniam would state that the bills purported to have been

issued by them on behalf of the respective shops were not actually issued by them. P.W.8 Thangan (a) Rangasamy has given a complaint to the

Deputy Commissioner with reference to the embezzlement of the temple funds by the accused persons.

P.W.9 Balasubramaniam, the Inspector of Religious Endowment, on the basis, of the direction given by the Deputy Commissioner conducted

the enquiry and examined various witnesses. After perusal of records, he gave a report stating that false bills have been fabricated by the accused

persons and by using the same, the temple funds have been misappropriated by them.

On the basis of this report, Ex.P.14 complaint was given to the police, who in turn took up the investigation. P.W. 15 Ramakrishnan the

Handwriting Expert, on the basis of the orders of the learned Magistrate and on the requisition of the Inspector of Police, received Exs.P-2 to P-

13 and compared the handwriting made in these documents with that of the admitted handwriting of A1 to A3 and he gave a report that the

handwritings found in those documents were written by the accused persons.

On the basis of these materials, the trial court as well as the lower appellate court imposed the conviction upon the accused persons for the

offences referred to above.

Mr. Srinivasan, the learned counsel appearing for the petitioner, would elaborately argue that the evidence of the shop owners is liable to be

rejected, since the original records were not produced and that P.W. 12 who is a successor to A1, the petitioner herein, was inimically disposed of

with the petitioner and he was in the background for foisting a false case against the petitioner and as such, the conviction cannot be sustained.

Ultimately, the learned counsel for the petitioner would confine himself, keeping in view of the revisional jurisdiction being so limited and state

that in any event, the opinion evidence given by P.W. 15 alone would not be sufficient to base the conviction. In order to substantiate the said

submission, he cited the following decisions:

R.S. Somra & another v. State of H.P.

State of Maharashtra Vs. Sukhdeo Singh and another Vs. State of Maharashtra Through C.B.I. Vs. Sukhdev Singh alias Sukha and others, ;

and

Magan Bihari Lal v. State of Punjab (1977. (Crl. L.J. 711 : 1977 L.W. (Crl.) 49 S.N.)

In reply to the said submission, the learned Government Advocate would submit that the reasonings given by the trial court and the appellate

court for basing the conviction are correct and that the opinion evidence of the Handwriting Expert can be acted upon by imposing the conviction,

even in the absence of substantial corroboration as laid down by the Apex Court in Muralilal v. State of M.P. (AIR 1980 S.C. 531 : 1980 L.W.

(Crl.) 88) .

I heard the counsel for the parties and perused the records and the citations.

It is well settled that the Expert''s opinion shall always be received with great caution. The Handwriting Expert''s evidence, by its very nature is

weak and cannot of itself form the basis for a conviction. But, however, it may be relied upon when supported by other items of internal and

external evidence. The evidence of the Expert, being an opinion evidence, can rarely, if even the place of substantive evidence. Before acting on

such evidence, it should be desirable to consider whether it is corroborated by direct evidence or by circumstantial evidence. It is unsafe to base a

conviction solely on Expert''s opinion without any substantial corroboration.

In other words, the courts, as rule of evidence, have to exercise extra care and caution in evaluating their opinion before accepting the Expert''s

opinion.

Normally, courts have considered it dangerous to base a conviction solely on the testimony of handwriting expert because such evidence is not

regarded as conclusive proof.

The above said principles, which have been mentioned in the citations placed by the learned counsel for the petitioner, are well established and

as such, there is no dispute in the position of law.

In this context, it is relevant to quote the observation of the Supreme Court rendered in the decision reported in AIR 1980 S.C. 531 (supra)

cited by the learned Government Advocate. The said observation is as follows:

We are firmly of the opinion that there is no rule of law, nor any rule of prudence which has crystallised into a rule of law, that opinion evidence of

a handwriting expert must never be acted upon, unless substantially corroborated. But, having due regard to the imperfect nature of the science of

identification of handwriting, the approach, as we indicated earlier, should be one of caution. Reasons for the opinion must be carefully probed and

examined. All other relevant evidence must be considered. In appropriate cases, corroboration may be sought. In cases where the reasons for the

opinion are convincing and there is no reliable evidence throwing a doubt, the uncorroborated testimony of an handwriting expert may be

accepted. There cannot be any inflexible rule on a matter which in the ultimate analysis, is no more than a question of testimonial weight. We have

said so much because this is an argument frequently met with in subordinate courts and sentences born out of context from the judgments of this

Court are often flaunted.

The reading of the judgment stated supra would make it clear that to base a conviction, there shall be other materials also to act upon the

opinion evidence of the handwriting expert. As stated earlier, the corroboration for the opinion evidence may be direct or through circumstantial

evidence.

In the light of this guideline, let us now discuss the material evidence adduced before the court by the prosecution against the petitioner.

There is no dispute in the fact that A1 was an Executive Officer of the temple under whom A2 and A3 were working. All the bills marked in

this case which were stated to have been used by the accused also would relate to the period in which the petitioner and two others were working.

It is quite important to see that P.Ws. 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7 deposed before the court that those bills were not issued by them and that no articles

were purchased by the accused from their shops at the relevant period.

No doubt, P.W. 12, who was the successor of A1 had some misunderstanding with Al, the petitioner herein. But, that does not mean that A1

was falsely implicated only at his instance.

As a matter of fact, on the direction by the Deputy Commissioner, P.W.9 conducted the enquiry by examining the witnesses, perused the

records and then sent a report against the petitioner and two others.

On the basis of this report alone, the case was registered against the accused by the police. Only during the course of investigation, the

specimen handwritings were obtained from the accused persons and the same were compared with the handwriting in the bills and thereafter, P.W.

15, Handwriting Expert, gave the opinion that the handwritings found in these documents were found to be of the accused. Under these

circumstances, it cannot be contended that the petitioner was convicted only on the basis of the Expert''s opinion.

Furthermore, the entire administration of the temple was in the hands of A1 the petitioner being an Executive Officer of the temple. The Audit

Officer had been examined as P.W. 13 in this case. In the report Ex.P-14, the details had been dearly given as to how the funds of the temple

were embezzled by the accused persons. P.W. 13 narrated those details in his deposition and nothing had been elicited from him in the cross

examination that he was speaking falsehood against the petitioner.

Furthermore, either from the answers, in S.313 questioning or in the cross examination of the witnesses, it is not shown that A1 was not

directly responsible for the said embezzlement.

In the light of these materials, the opinion evidence of the Handwriting Expert. P.W. 15 assumes importance. The perusal of the evidence of

P.W. 15 would reveal that there is no cross examination to his opinion made against the petitioner with reference to the fabricated documents.

In such circumstances, I am not able to persuade myself to agree with the contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner that only opinion

evidence is available which cannot be acted upon.

At the risk of repetition. I could say that apart from the opinion evidence which was not actually challenged by the petitioner in the cross

examination, there are other materials also in the form of circumstantial evidence and in the absence of any explanation by the accused, it can be

safely concluded that the petitioner also committed the offences referred to above along with other accused.

In the result, the Revision fails as devoid of merits and accordingly, the same is dismissed.