B. Seshasayana Reddy ORDER
A. Gopal Reddy, J.
1. This revision petition filed under Article 227 of the Constitution of India to revise the order dt. 10-10-2007 in IA No. 1210/2006 in OS No. 291/2000 on the file of I Additional District Judge, Guntur was listed before us on a reference being made by a learned single Judge of this Court to decide the question "whether an application under Section 45 of the Evidence Act filed for sending the signatures for comparison and expert opinion, can be entertained at the later stage, including when coming up for arguments after entire trial?"
When the revision petition came up for admission before a learned single Judge of this Court, it was pointed out the inconsistent views taken by two learned Judges of this Court for maintaining the applications filed seeking expert's opinion at the belated stage of arguments in Kaveti Sarada v. Vemineni Hymavati 2006 (4) ALT 56 , Pulaparti Sankuntala Bai v. Mygapula Ramanjaneyulu MANU/AP/0130/2006 : 2006(3)ALD146 and Guru Govindu v. Devarapu Venkataramana 2006 (6) ALT 17 .
2. Before we proceed to answer the reference, we must say the exercise of revisional jurisdiction under Article 227 for revising the order impugned is uncalled for at this stage, since the order if allowed to stand will not attain finality, and the learned trial Judge in his discretion, may accept the expert's evidence or may not accept the same. Further, if the trial court decides the issue only on the basis of the expert evidence, the same is capable of correction in appeal, if any, preferred by the aggrieved party. In the absence of any prejudice or manifest injustice would be done to the parties revision itself cannot be entertained as the same will not fall under the exceptions carved out by the Supreme Court in Surya Dev Rao v. Ram Chander Rao MANU/SC/0559/2003 : AIR2003SC3044 .
We have heard the learned Counsel for the petitioner as well as the learned Counsel appearing for the respondent.
The substratum of the arguments of the learned Counsel for the petitioner is that the trial court committed an illegality in exercising the discretion at the fag end of trial i.e., after closing the evidence, filing of such application cannot be entertained, and allowing IA amounts to reopening the suit for the purpose of leading evidence, which is not at all warranted.
3. Per contra, learned Counsel for the respondent contended that once the trial court exercised discretion, evidence cannot be shut in and same will not cause any prejudice to the petitioner, who will be provided an opportunity to object the report filed into the court, therefore, the same needs no interference. Reliance is placed on the very same judgments, on which basis reference is made by the learned single Judge.
It is convenient to consider the submissions in the light of the judgments, which were referred in the order of reference.
4. At this stage, we lightly touch the facts in the cases referred to above before answering the reference.
In Kaveti Sarada MANU/AP/0347/2006 : 2006 (4) ALT 56, the plaintiff filed suit for recovery of a sum on the basis of a pronote. After examining the witnesses on behalf of the plaintiff, the defendant filed IA under Order 26 Rule 10 CPC r/w Section 45 of the Indian Evidence Act with a prayer to send pronote to the hand-writing expert for comparing the signature........