Courts must obtain handwriting expert opinions in cases involving disputed signatures, ensuring proper determination of authenticity to avoid erroneous judgments.

JUDGMENT :

AJIT KUMAR, J.

1. Heard Sri Namman Raj Vanshi, learned counsel for the revision applicant and Sri Hemant Kumar, learned counsel for the landlady/respondent.

2. This S.C.C. Revision is directed against the order passed by the Judge, Small Causes namely the Additional District and Sessions Judge, Meerut rejecting misc. application filed by the tenant/petitioner bearing paper no. 158-C2 seeking for handwriting expert opinion in respect of the disputed receipts bearing paper no. 33-C as according to the stand taken by the tenant the receipt against rent were used to be issued by the son of erstwhile landlady Harbhajan Kaur namely Sardar Devendra Singh.

3. He submits that it was Sardar Devendra Singh who used to sign the receipts in the name of Harbhajan Kaur and that was why even after the death of Harbhajan Kaur the receipts were issued in the name of Harbhajan Singh Kaur by her son Sardar Devendra Singh and this receipt was for a sum of Rs. 16,000/- taken towards rent running from 13.12.2018 to 12.04.2019.

4. According to learned counsel for the petitioner, Mr. Namman Raj Vanshi, if last receipt stands proved then the petitioner would not be in arrears of rent. It is also submitted by him that in the cross examination Sardar Devendra Singh very conveniently avoided to make statement that he used to sign the receipt as only this statement had came up thus his signatures were not on the receipts. Mr. Raj Vanshi submits that there is no dispute as to the fact that the receipts were issued in the name of Harbhajan Kaur who was the landlady. It is submitted next by Sri Raj Vanshi that the court was not justified in holding that even in the absence of handwriting expert, the Court itself could compare the signatures on the receipts to come to find answer to a complexed question whether receipts were signed by a person in the same handwriting in the name of another person. It is submitted that the signatures are in Gurmukhi and therefore, the Court was not justified in rejecting the misc. application for handwriting expert.

5. In support of his submission, learned counsel for the petitioner has placed reliance upon the decision of Supreme Court in the case of O. Bharathan v. K. Sudhakaran and Another , (1996) 2 SCC 704 and has placed before the Court paragraph nos. 12, 15 and 18 of the said judgment which run as under:

"12. It appears that the learned Judge has decided the question of void and invalid votes on insufficient materials and evidence in the case. Majority of the witnesses denied that they have voted more than once and they have also denied their signatures in the counterfoils. Under such circumstances, the learned judge could have summoned documents containing admitted signatures for comparison by an expert and also by comparing them himself. Instead the learned judge understood the hazardous task of comparing hundreds of disputed signatures which are not having individual characteristics to set aside the election of a candidate, the appellant herein.

15. On the peculiar facts of this case, the learned Judge erred in taking upon himself the task of comparing the disputed signatures on the counterfoils without the aid of an expert or the evidence of persons conversant with the disputed signatures. Therefore, the approach made by the learned judge is not in conformity with the spirit of Section 73 of the Evidence Act. Though the rulings of this Court in State vs. Pali Ram, AIR 1