Certified copies of registered deeds are admissible in evidence under the Indian Evidence Act and should be tentatively marked as exhibits without requiring the registering authority's presence for proof of execution.

JUDGMENT :

(Ajoy Kumar Mukherjee, J.)

1. This application under Article 227 of the constitution of India has been assailed against order no. 32 dated 06.10.2018 passed by learned Judge 8th Bench, City Civil Court, Calcutta in Title Suit no. 692 of 2014. Petitioners case in a nutshell is that petitioners as plaintiffs have instituted aforesaid suit against the defendants/opposite parties herein with a prayer for declaration, injunction and for other consequential relief. On receipt of summon of the said suit, the defendants/opposite parties entered appearance and filed their written statements denying material allegations made in the plaint which includes the statement that the defendant no. 2 to 3 and defendant no. 6 on suppression of material facts or by practicing fraud upon the registering authority, somehow have managed to get impugned deeds of conveyance dated 20.12.2008 without complying with any of the requisite formalities.

2. On the date of peremptory hearing, the plaintiffs tendered their examination-in-chief on affidavit under the provision of order XVIII Rule 4 of the code of the Civil Procedure (in short “code”) and at the same time duly tendered certain documents for admitting in evidence and prayed for marking those documents as exhibit. Out of those documents three documents namely the certified copies of the deed of conveyance although were tendered but learned court below did not mark said documents as exhibit but marked with the letter “Y” “XX’ “YY” for identification. The plaintiffs/petitioners herein took out an application under Section 151 of the code seeking an order for admitting the certified copy of the said deeds into evidence by marking the said deeds as exhibit on the ground that the certified copy of registered deeds are certified to be true by a public officer under Section 76 of the Indian EVIDENCE ACT , 1872 (in short Act of 1872) and in that view of the matter , the certified copies of deed of conveyance are public documents within the meaning of Section 74 of the Act of 1872 and as such certified copies of the deeds are very much admissible in evidence without calling the registrar as witness. It was further contended in the said application that it is well settled position of law that the certified copy of the public documents prepared under Section 76 of the Act of 1872 is admissible under Section 77 of the said act.

3. Learned court below had taken up said application for hearing but by the impugned order rejected the same.

4. Mr Routh learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners submits that the court below rejected the said application on some erroneous observations and failed to appreciate and consider that the certified copy of a deed of conveyance which is copied from original document and compared and attested by responsible authorized officer of the Government office is actually the true copy of the original document which is always admissible in evidence. Accordingly the court below ought to have admitted such documents and marked those documents as exhibit in view of Section 76 read with Section 77 of the Act of 1872. The finding of the court below that the “mere fact that the document is forthcoming from a government department and bear its seal will not dispense with the necessity of formalities proving those documents” is perverse and not justified. In this context petitioner has relied upon following judgments

(i) State of Haryana Vs. Ram Sin