IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA C.R. No.1002 of 2008 BACHCHA PRASAD Versus KAMESHWAR PD.@KAMESHWAR PD.&AN ----------- 3 30/7/2008 Heard counsel for the petitioner. The approach of the court below in rejecting the application for exhibiting a Photostat copy cannot be said to be vitiated either on account of any material irregularity or jurisdictional error, in as much as, the court below has rightly proceeded that if secondary evidence is to be adduced, the same can be admitted in evidence only as per procedure known to law. Admittedly, no evidence was adduced nor any person was examined by the petitioner till the date of the impugned order to establish that the document in question was Photostat copy of the original, which is said to have been lost and therefore if the court below has therefore proceeded by taking into account that the petitioner did not take any effective steps for adducing that document in the secondary evidence, this Court would not find any fault in such approach of the court below which in the impugned order has held that the petitioner had to prove that original of the said document has been lost. A mere informatory application filed in the court of Subdivisional Judicial Magistrate in the opinion of the court, was not sufficient to prove authenticity and correctness of the said document, so as to allow the prayer of petitioner for admitting a photocopy in evidence. 2 Counsel for the petitioner next contended that keeping in view the scope of section 63 of the Evidence Act denying the admitting of secondary evidence in the light of the judgment of this Court in the case of Ganga Sagar reported in 2002 (2) P.L.J.R page 772, was itself a jurisdictional error. In the opinion of it cannot be held as a blank proposition of law that a Photostat copy of the documents has to be admitted in evidence for its being marked as exhibit as a matter of course. The reliance placed by the learned counsel on the decision of this Court in the case of Ganga Sagar (supra) is also misplaced in as much as, there it was an admitted fact that two witnesses were brought to prove the said Photostat copy, the document, and they had stated that it was made in their presence from its original. The facts of this case however is altogether different in as much as no evidence was led by the petitioner and as such a mere bald statement was wholly insufficient to allow the prayer of the petitioner for admitting the photocopy of the document in evidence by way of secondary evidence. In the result, there is no merit in this application and the same is accordingly dismissed. ( Mihir Kumar Jha, J.) Abhay Kumar