The main legal point established in the judgment is the requirement for substantial corroboration and the weakness of the corroborative evidence in cases relying on handwriting analysis. The judgment also emphasizes the importance of proving the genuineness of documents used for comparison in handwriting analysis.

Sundara Aiyar, J.

1. The appellant, who was the 1st accused in Sessions Case No. 19 of 1910 in the Sessions Court of South Canara, was tried along with two other persons, the appellant for the forgery and the two others for abetment of the forgery of certain documents. These documents were certain Income Tax records in the Udipi Taluq office in the office of the Head Assistant Collector of South Canara. The forged documents related to the assessment to Income Tax of one Vishnumurti Upidhya for the year 1905--1906. The prosecution alleges that the B. Schedule of income put in by Vishnumurti under the Income Tax Act, the takid issued to the Village Officers of Gundmi to send a report, the takid issued to the Patel of Gundmi to communicate to the assessee the order of confirmation of the tax, the deposition of Vishnumurti before the Village Officers, the deposition of Venkatatrmana Bhatta (a witness) before them, the list of the houses prepared by the Shanbhog and the report submitted by him to the Tahsildar, were all re-placed with forged documents in substitution for the original ones, and that an interpolation was made in the deposition of Vishnumurti before the Head Assistant Collector after the confirmation of the tax. Three of the above documents were selected as the subject-matter of the charges against the accused, namely, the deposition of Vishnumurti before the Tahsildar, Exhibit B, the B. Schedule put in by him, Exhibit T, and the interpolation in his statement before the Head Assistant Collector, Exhibit H, Exhibit HI being the interpolation. These forgeries are alleged to have been made in the interest of one Nagappa Hande. Nagappa was also charged with forgery before the Committing Magistrate but died after his commitment to the Sessions Court. These two persons Nagappa Hande and Vishnumurti financed one Tammaya Urala in 1897 in a partition suit instituted by Tammaya Urala against his undivided co-parceners. Nagappa obtained a mortgage-bond from Tammaya Urala and executed a mortgage himself in favour of Vishnumurti on the 24th March 1898. Nagappa alleged that the mortgage-debt due to Vishnumurti by him was discharged except a small portion. In 1898, Vishnumurti filed a suit in the District Court of South Canara on the mortgage-deed and produced a copy of it. The suit was transferred to the Sub-Court where it was registered as 0. S. No. 53 of 1909 According to Vishnumurti and the prosecution case here, Nagappa made no payment whatever towards the mortgage. Nagappa, in support of his plea that the major portion of the debt had been paid off, produced along with his written statement certain correspondence which he alleged passed between him and Vishnumurti in 1898,1899, 1904, 1905 and 1906, as well as receipts and acknowledgments for payments made by him. Vishnumurti denounced those documents as forgeries. When Vishnumurti was being cross-examined in the Sub-Court as a witness, he was shown certain certified copies of Income Tax proceedings relating to him and cross-examined with reference to them. He denounced these also as forgeries. They were not filed in the Sub-Court, though the plaintiff Vishnumurti and the Court called upon Nagappa Hande to produce them. Nagappa applied for copies of these Income Tax proceedings in. February 1909; these certified copies were the documents used at the cross-examination of Vishnumurti. The first accused is alleged to be the writer of these documents. He is a petition-writer by profession, the 2nd and 3rd accused were respectively an attender of the Head Assistant Collectors office and the record-keeper of the Udipi Taluq office. They are alleged to have helped Nagappa in obtaining the records of these two offices The Sessions Judge after a very elaborate inquiry convicted the 1st accused and acquitted the 2nd and 3rd accused. The 1st accused has appealed to this Court from his conviction.

2. Most of the evidence in the case was adduced for proving that the documents in ques