JUDGMENT

Mukerji, J. - The applicant, Babu Ram Nath, who is a practising Mukhtar at Agra was convicted by a First Class Magistrate of Agra of the offences under Sections 419 and 465 of the Indian Penal Code, read with Section 114 of the same Code. He was sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for two years. He appealed. The learned Sessions Judge found that the case of abetment of cheating u/s 419 of the Indian Penal Code had not been established. But he was of opinion that the applicant was guilty of abetment of an offence u/s 465 of the Indian Penal Code and sentenced him to undergo simple imprisonment for one year.

2. In this Court several points have been taken. But before the points urged are mentioned, it would be necessary to know exactly what the case is.

3. It appears that a keenly contested election to the Municipal Board of Agra was going on. The applicant was one of the candidates for election. There were two vacancies in Board and there were five candidates. Dr. Ram Sarup Sarain was one of the other four candidates and the applicant and Dr. Ram Sarup being friends worked together. Indeed it was Dr. Bam Sarup and his agents who tried for the successful election of both. The 24th of March, 1923, was the date of election. Election was going on at the premises of the Municipal Office. A certain person, whose identity has not bean established, come forward and claimed to be one of the voters, viz., Hari Shanker. According to the rules, this man, professing to be an illiterate person put his thumb-mark on the document Exhibit I, called 'signature-sheet' and the applicant, Ram Nath, put his signature on the document as a witness who knew the voter. It has been established that the man who represented Hari Shanker was not the real Hari Shanker and that the applicant attested the signature sheet without knowing that the person who put his thumb-mark to the sheet was not the real voter.

4. Several points have been urged against the validity of the conviction and these are:

(1) That there could be no prosecution without a sanction of the Local Government u/s 96 of the Criminal Procedure Code, as the offence committed was really one u/s 176(P) of the Indian Penal Code.

(2) That the attestation was made innocently and without any intention to abet a forgery.

(3) That attestation was wholly unnecessary and, therefore, no offence has been committed.

5. Point No. 1. - By Act 39 of 1920, a new chapter described as "Chapter 9(A), of offences relating to election" was added to the Indian Penal Code in 1920. One of these offences as described in Section 171(D) is as follows:

Whoever, at an election, applies for a voting paper or votes in the name of any other person, whether living or dead, or in a fictitious name, or who having voted once at such election applies at the same election for a voting paper in his own name, and whoever abets, procures or attempts to procure the voting by any person in any such way commits the offence of personation at the election.

6. By Section 171(F) the offence of personation at election was declared to be punishable with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to one year or with fine or with both.

7. The description of the charge brought against the applicant clearly shows that it is alleged that the applicant committed the offence of personation at election. It is true that according to the rulings of the Allahabad High Court and some other Courts whoever prepares a false document for the purpose of establishing a claim, which need not necessarily be claim to property, must be deemed to be guilty of forgery, and whoever aids or instigates the commission of such an offence must be taken to have aided or abetted such forgery. It must, therefore, be conceded that, under certain circumstances, the false preparation of a signature-sheet may amount to forgery within the meaning of Section 463 of the Indian Penal Code. It is also to be remembered that there are rulings of certain High Cour