Revisional courts cannot equate their powers with appellate courts, and must only intervene upon clear errors or miscarriage of justice.

O R D E R

The revision petitioner is the accused and he is challenging the judgment of the learned Additional Sessions Judge-III, Mavelikkara in Crl. Appeal No. 204 of 2018, whereby his conviction and sentence for the offence under Section 468 IPC is confirmed.

2. The prosecution case is that the accused, while working as Marketing Executive in the share business, persuaded the de facto complainant to purchase a bond for value of Rs.1,11,000 of Sardar Sarovar Narmada Sangam on 29.06.1995 with the dishonest intention of cheating the de facto complainant and thereafter, the accused obtained duplicate bond certificate from the company and by forging the signature of the de facto complainant and his wife, effected the transfer of the bond to his name and thereby, committed the offences under Sections

420 and 468 of IPC .

3. Even though, the trial court convicted and sentenced the accused for the offences under Sections 420 and 468 of IPC , the appellate court set aside the conviction and sentence for the offence under Section 420 and confirmed his conviction and sentence for the offence under Section 468 .

4. Heard Sri. B. Premnath, the learned counsel for the revision petitioner and Smt. Maya M.N., the learned Public Prosecutor.

5. The learned counsel for the revision petitioner argued that in the absence of any expert opinion regarding the genuineness of the signature of PW2 and his wife in Exhibit P1 share transfer form, the trial court and the appellate court are not justified in arriving at a conclusion that the signature in Exhibit P1 is not that of PW2 by invoking the power under Section 73 of the Indian Evidence Act and therefore, the conviction and sentence passed against the accused for the offence under Section 468 IPC is liable to be set aside

6. The learned Public Prosecutor argued that a perusal of the answers given by the accused at the time of 313 questioning would show that he has no case that it was PW2 and his wife who signed Exhibit P1 as transferors and apart from denying all the incriminating evidence against him, he has not made any attempt to admit or deny his signature seen in Exhibit P1 share transfer form and Exhibit P6 application to the company for effecting transfer of the bond certificate to his name. It is pertinent to note that the evidence of PW2 that the signature in Exhibit P1 share transfer form is not his signature and that the signature seen in the said share transfer form is also not that of his wife Valasala Ashok, is supported by the evidence of Pws 1, 4, 5 and 6.

7. The learned Public Prosecutor also pointed out that the wife of PW2 was no more at the time of trial and hence, she could not be examined as a witness. I find force in the argument of the learned Public Prosecutor that the trial court and the appellate court invoked the power under Section 73 of the Indian Evidence Act to compare the admitted signatures of PW2 with that of the signature seen in Exhibit P1 share transfer form only for arriving at a conclusion regarding the credibility of the oral evidence of PW2 that the signature in Exhibit P1 share transfer form is not his signature. In this connection, it is also pertinent to note that while cross examining PW2, the learned counsel for the accused put a specific question as to how the bond is transferred to Selvaraj (the revision petitioner) and PW2 answered that the accused forged his signature and the signature of his wife in the share transfer form and thereafter, made a request to the company and effected transfer.

8. As noticed earlier, the accused/revision petitioner has not disputed his signature in Exhib