A criminal court has no option but to apply Section 294 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and read documents in evidence if their genuineness is not disputed by the other side.

JUDGMENT :

S.K. Mohanty, J. - Accused is in revision against order passed by the Judicial Magistrate, not allowing his prayer to read as evidence certain receipts filed by him or to recall the complainant for further examination with reference to the receipts or to afford reasonable opportunity to the accused to prove the same.

2. Accused petitioner is being tried for the offences Under Sections 419 and 420, IPC. in the Court below. Statement of the accused petitioner was recorded on 19-9-1988. He declined to adduce evidence and argument was heard on that day. The case was then posted to 24-9-1988 for judgment. On 23-9-1988 the accused filed a petition stating that he was filing some money receipts which may be read as evidence in the case, if their genuineness is not disputed or also complainant may be recalled for further examination or reasonable opportunity may be given to the accused to prove those receipts.

3. It is urged on behalf of the accused, that the trial Court should have allowed his prayer to bring the receipts in question on record as they were essential to the just decision of the case.

4. In the impugned order dated 30-9-1988 with reference to the petition dated 23-9-1988, the learned Magistrate has observed :"it will be just and proper not to recall the complainant to prove the documents as the complainant may avoid to prove these documents. As the defence wants to prove the documents in support of his case, the defence should take the risk of proving the same." He however further observed, that though a list of documents has been filed, the relevant documents have not been filed along with the list and thus the Court has no chance to verify and ascertain the relevancy of those documents. On these grounds, he rejected the prayer of the accused. Thereafter on 1-10-1988, Advocate for the accused filed the receipts in question explaining that he had duly filed the same in Court but had taken them back at the instance of the bench clerk and prayed for their acceptance.On this, the learned Magistrate by order dated 13-10-1938 rejected the prayer on the ground that the petition had been filed at argument stage and there was no separate prayer for giving chance to prove the documents. Then the accused filed two petitions on 2-11-1988 praying for' acceptance of the documents and recalling the complainant or giving him a chance to prove the same. The learned Magistrate by order dated 8-11-1988 rejected both the prayers on the technical ground that the earlier orders are not open for review by him.

5. For proper appreciation, the case of the complainant may be stated in brief. The complainant is the Deputy Manager in charge of legal matters of Orissa State Co-operative Milk Producers" Federation Ltd. (for short, 'OMFED'). The business of OMFED is to procure, process and market milk and milk products. In the process it supplies milk to various institutions like hospitals, schools etc. Complainant alleged that the accused falsely representing himself as the Diet-in-charge of the Institute of Paediatrics, Sishu Bhawan, Cuttack, requested the Managing Director, O M F E D on 1-12-1981 to supply 20 litres milk daily to Sishu Bhawan. Accordingly, the Director believing the representation to be true, started supplying OMFED milk to the accused for catering the needs of the children's hospital, i. e. Sishu Bhawan, at the rate of 20 litres per day on credit. The accused used to collect the credit bills regularly from the office of the OMFED and make occasional payments. It was noticed subsequently that the accused was in heavy arrears to the tune of Rs. 20,780/- and on inquiry it was ascertained that accused was not really the Diet-in-charge of Sishu Bhawan, but was a private contractor and was raising separate bills on the Institution for supply of milk and taking payments from Sishu Bhawan.

6. The accused denied to have made any false representation to OMFED authorities. According to him in his own capacity, he purchased milk from