JUDGMENT

Daniels, J. - In this case the appellant Janki Prasad, a patwari was committed to the Court of Sessions on charges under Sections 218 and 471, I.P.C. The charge was that he knowingly prepared a wrong record, namely a jinsi bahi-khata, showing a tenant named Mendai as paying a grain-rent, whereas in fact he paid a cash rent, and that he produced this paper in Court to support a false defence put in by Mendai in a suit for arrears of rent. The revenue Court held that the defence was false and decreed the suit. Thereafter the plaintiff in that suit filed a complaint against the patwari which has resulted in the order under appeal. The learned Sessions Judge held on the merits that it was fully proved that Mendai had agreed to pay a cash rent and that the patwari knowingly prepared a false record. The patwari was under suspension and had given overcharge at the time when the bahi-khata was to (Sic) in evidence. The learned Sessions Judge held for some reason which is not clear to me that if the record was prepared before the patwari's suspension the only offence which he could be held to have committed would be an offence u/s 218 and not an offence u/s 471, I.P.C. The same act may be, and often is, an offence under more than one section of the Penal Code, and if the act amounted to forgery it would not cease to be forgery because it also amounted to an offence u/s 218. The learned advocate for the appellant has taken a different point which does not seem to have been raised at the trial. He points out that the offence u/s 471 was committed in relation to a proceeding in a Court and therefore that under the provisions of Section 195, Criminal P.C., no charge in respect of such offence could be entertained except on the complaint of the Court. Before the recent amendment of the Criminal P.C., a sanction and not a complaint would have been required, and the law as it then stood laid down that the absence of a sanction would not invalidate the proceedings. This portion of Section 537 has now been omitted, and it appears to me that since the amendment if a Court entertains a case covered by Section 195, Criminal P.C., without such a complaint as the law requires its proceedings are void. The case would appear to come u/s 530(p). The Court is not empowered to try the offender except upon a complaint made by the proper authority.

2. The learned Sessions Judge came to the conclusion that the record was prepared after the patwari gave over charge and has, therefore, convicted him u/s 471. Section 195(1)(c) deals only with offences by a party, but even assuming that this conviction u/s 471 cannot be upheld, this does not end the matter. It appears to me that the learned Sessions Judge was wrong in thinking that the record was prepared after the patwari gave over charge. The patwari himself declares that he prepared it prior to making over charge, and this is supported by the fact that he entered it in the list of papers to be made over when he gave over charge, but as he did not in fact make over this paper to the qanungo the entry was struck out. The rent suit against Mendai was filed nearly a month before the patwari was suspended. If the offence committed by the patwari was really one u/s 218 it is open to the appellate Court under the provisions of Section 423(1)(b), Criminal P.C., to alter the conviction to one under that section even though the trial Court may have acquitted the accused under that section. This has been decided in several cases both of our own and of other High Courts. Cases of this High Court are Emperor v. Sardar (1912) 34 All 115 and Dulli Vs. Emperor, AIR 1918 All 65 There are Madras and Calcutta rulings to the same effect e.g., Appanna v. Pithani Mahalakshmi (1911) 34 Mad 545 and Queen-Empress v. Jabanulla (1896) 23 Cal 975.

3. On the merits the learned Sessions Judge has shown conclusively that Mendai's statement that he took the land on a grain-rent was false. The plea pressed on behalf of the patwari is