ORAL JUDGMENT

1. By this petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner has challenged the order dated 18.12.2013 passed by the Small Causes Court, Rajkot below Exhibit-237, to the extent the trial court has given tentative exhibit to the document and further seeks a direction to the trial court to give a permanent exhibit to the documents which are referred to in the deposition of defendant witness No.1.

2. The respondents No.1.1 to 1.4 are the heirs and legal representatives of the original plaintiff, whereas the petitioners are the heirs and legal representatives of the original defendant No.2 and the respondent No.2 is the original defendant No.1. The original plaintiff instituted a suit being Civil Suit No.169 of 1990 in the Small Causes Court, at Rajkot for obtaining vacant possession of the rented shop premises. The original plaintiff and the defendant No.2 have expired during the pendency of the suit and it is their heirs who are prosecuting the proceedings. In the proceedings of the said suit, on behalf of the defendants, one Vallabhbhai Bhurabhai Pipaliya, who was discharging duties as Shop and Establishment Inspector with the Rajkot Municipal Corporation, came to be examined at Exhibit 392. In his examination-in- chief, the witness stated that he had brought the original record of 8987 with him and based upon the same, he had prepared the certified copies which bear his signature as Shop Inspector, the signature of Makwanabhai as Junior Clerk and Bhindebhai as Mukkamal. The registration has been renewed till 1989 and he has produced a true copy thereof which is prepared on the basis of the original. The learned advocate for the defendants requested that the document be exhibited. On the other hand, the learned advocate for the plaintiff objected to the same on the ground that in terms of section 76 of the Indian Evidence Act, the questions are yet to be put during the course of cross-examination and that the decision for exhibiting the document be taken after the cross-examination in respect of such document at the instance of the plaintiff is over. On behalf of the defendants, the learned advocate contended that the document was a certified copy of a public document and the original had been brought before the court. The document is a certified copy in terms of section 76 of the Evidence Act and has been proved by way of the oral testimony of the witness. It was submitted that the suit is pending since 1990 and the plaintiff and defendants have passed away during the pendency of the suit and in both cases, their heirs have been brought on record and hence, such baseless objection may not be taken into consideration.

3. The trial court after considering the submissions advanced by the learned advocates for the respective parties, was of the view that when an objection has been raised to exhibiting the document, in view of the decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Bipin Shantilal Panchal v. State of Gujarat, 2001 (2) GLH 545, the question as regards the admissibility of the document in evidence is required to be considered at the time of evaluating the evidence and that the same requires to be given a tentative exhibit. Accordingly, the document was given tentative Exhibit No.396, which has given rise to the present petition.

4. Mr. Mrugen Purohit, learned counsel for the petitioners vehemently assailed the impugned order by submitting that in the facts and circumstances of this case, the trial court was not justified in giving the exhibit a tentative number instead of admitting the document in evidence. It was submitted that the document in question is a certified copy of public record and the original has also been produced before the court and the witness has proved the same before the court, therefore, there was no reason to give it a tentative exhibit merely because an objection had been raised against admitting the same. It was contended that in view of the provisions of Order VIII