IMPORTANT POINT
The main legal point established in the judgment is the admissibility of certified copies of documents as secondary evidence under the Indian Evidence Act, 1872. The court clarified the conditions and requirements for admitting secondary evidence, emphasizing the need to prove the existence and execution of the original document and the authentication of secondary evidence.

ORDER :

1. By way of filing the present petition under Article 227 of Constitution of India, the petitioners have challenged the order dated 03.10.2023 passed by Learned Additional District Judge No. 7, Jodhpur Metropolitan. Petitioners have also prayed that the applications filed by the respondents-plaintiffs may kindly be rejected and the Learned Court below may be restrained from taking the documents produced by respondents-plaintiffs on record as admissible in evidence and mark them as exhibits.

2. Brief facts of the case are that the respondents-plaintiffs filed a petition for recovery of possession, declaration, mesne-profit and permanent injunction against the petitioners-defendants while stating that the petitioners are the encroachers over a part of the property, Plot No. 455 admeasuring 556.11 square yard situated at Pal Link Road, Jodhpur. The said property had been allotted to Late Shri Ramchandra (father of the respondent/plaintiff No. 1) and respondent/plaintiff No. 1 by Urban Improvement Trust, Jodhpur on 07.10.1970 and thereafter a license in respect of which was issued in the name of the father of the respondent-plaintiff and respondent-plaintiff No. 1 on 15.5.1974. Also, a patta in respect of the allotted land was issued in favour of father of the respondent-plaintiff and respondent-plaintiff No. 1 which was registered on 22.06.1991.

3. Furthermore, the husband of petitioner-defendant No. 1 late Taj Mohammad had illegally encroached upon a part of the suit property of the defendants to the extent of one 88 square yard and thereafter had made an application before the Land Conversion Officer, Jodhpur, for regularizing his illegal encroachment which was accepted and resultantly on 03.03.1990 a patta was issued in favour of the Taj Mohammed. Thereafter, the grant of Patta in favour of the Taj Mohammad was contested by the respondent-plaintiff at various forums and Shri Taj Mohammad also filed a suit qua UIT, Jodhpur, wherein an interim order was granted in favour of the petitioners. Moreover, the part of suit property which was not possessed by the respondents/plaintiffs was sold by them vide registered deed dated 28.7.2008 to Manohar Lal Paliwal.

4. Learned Court after hearing both the parties, framed 10 issues and decided the dispute on 19.12.2022. Thereafter, respondent-plaintiff No. 2 had submitted an affidavit for the purpose of examination-in-chief, but never produced relevant documents in support of the plaint and only produced mechanical copies or the certified copies of the documents submitted in support of the plaint.

5. Though the respondent-plaintiff No. 2 in the affidavit (Annexure-4) had marked the copy of the license dated 15.05.1974 as Exhibit-1 and the Copy of the Patta dated 22.06.1991 as Exhibit-2, but had not produced original documents at the time of filling the plaint and moreover even at the time of filling affidavit the original copy of the documents were not produced. Therefore, the respondents-plaintiffs had filed an application on 04.08.2023 under Order 7 Rule 14 C.P.C. for taking these documents on record.

6. The respondents-plaintiffs also filed another application under Section 65 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1972, seeking permission for leading secondary evidence as they had not submitted the original documents. Subsequently, the Learned trial court vide common order dated 03.10.2023 (Annexure-7) has decided both the applications i.e. the application under Section 65 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 and the application under Order 7 Rule 14 of CPC, filed by the plaintiffs and resultantly allowed the respondent-plaintiff to give photocopies of documents as evidence.

7. Being aggrieved of the impugned order dated 03.10.2023 passed by the Additional District and Sessions Judge No. 7, Jodhpur, the petitioners-defendants have preferred this Writ Petition.

8. Learned Counsel for petitioners submits that the respondents-plaintiffs have neither before nor after the settlement of issues has produced