1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY BENCH AT AURANGABAD WRIT PETITION NO. 2994 OF 2010 Kamalbai w/o. Fulawatibai Jadhav ..Petitioner/s Versus Dagdu s/o. Sonaji Jadhav and others. .. Respondent/s. --- Mr. V.C. Patil, Advocate holding for Mr. V.D. Patnoorkar, Advocate for petitioner. CORAM : R.M. BORDE, J. DATE : 19th April, 2010. ORAL ORDER :- 1] An application tendered by the petitioner/original defendant making a request to the trial court, to tender document to the Government Expert for securing opinion as regards the thumb impression of the defendant No.1 and signature of the defendant No.2 appearing on the document, has been turned down by the trial court, in view of the order dated 18/2/2010 and the said interlocutory order passed by the trial court in a pending suit, has been subjected to challenge in this petition. 2 2] The plaintiff/respondent herein, presented a suit claiming specific performance of contract and perpetual injunction against the defendant/petitioner bearing R.C.S. No. 316/1998. The agreement,which is the basis for claiming specific performance has been denied by the defendant. The plaintiff therefore filed an application for referring the document to an Handwriting Expert to secure his opinion. Initially, the document was referred to one expert and his opinion was secured. However, witness summons issued to the said expert has been returned back for the reason that the concerned expert has left the town. As such, the document was referred to another expert. While the said expert was summoned and was to be examined before the court, at that stage, the petitioner/defendant presented an application requesting for referring the document to a Government Handwriting expert. The defendant also refused to examine the expert witness on the relevant date and insisted upon the court to consider his application for sending the document to Govt. Handwriting Expert. . The trial court, on considering the rival submissions, turned down the request made by the petitioner/defendant. 3] I have perused the application as well as the impugned order passed by the trial court. As the plaintiffs are claiming that they are entitled to property on the basis of an agreement executed in 3 their favour by the defendant and the defendants claim that the document does not bear their signature, burden lies on the defendant to establish the same. The plaintiffs have already secured an opinion of the expert regarding authenticity of document. The suit is pending in the trial court since 1998. At the stage of recording evidence of the expert, instant application is belatedly tendered by the defendant. The defendants can lead their evidence and substantiate their contentions before the trial court. The opinion of expert solicited and his evidence would be appreciated by the trial court while dealing with the matter on its own merit, in accordance with the provisions of the Indian Evidence Act. At this stage of the proceedings, no interference is warranted in the matter in exercise of extraordinary jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The petition is devoid of substance. The same is rejected. [R.M. BORDE,J.] grt/