No Forgery Merely Because Person Executed Document Wrongly Claiming Ownership Of Property : Supreme Court

The Supreme Court has observed that a person does not commit forgery merely by executing a document asserting ownership over a property, even if that claim is subsequently found to be legally unsustainable.

“…when a person executes a document claiming property as his own, there is no making of a false document merely because the claim is ultimately found to be incorrect.”, the Court held in approval with Mohd. Ibrahim v. State of Bihar, (2009) 8 SCC 751.

In Mohd.Ibrahim, it was held :

"When a document is executed by a person claiming a property which is not his, he is not claiming that he is someone else nor is he claiming that he is authorised by someone else. Therefore, execution of such document (purporting to convey some property of which he is not the owner) is not execution of a false document as defined under Section 464 of the Code. If what is executed is not a false document, there is no forgery. If there is no forgery, then neither Section 467 nor Section 471 of the Code are attracted.”

A bench of Justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Vipul M. Pancholi heard a case in which the appellants had executed a Power of Attorney asserting their ownership rights over a disputed property. After their claim of title was ultimately found unsustainable, criminal proceedings for forgery were initiated against them on the premise that, since they had no valid ownership interest in the property, the document through which they asserted such rights was itself forged.

Setting aside the Gujarat High Court's decision refusing to quash the FIR against the Appellants, a judgment authored by Justice Pancholi observed that the High Court wrongly proceeded on the premise that upon declaration of the Appellants' claim to be unsustainable, the documents purportedly executed by them to claim their ownership were a fraudulent act. The Court said that the documents relied upon to claim ownership rights would not be regarded as 'false documents', merely because the claim remained unsuccessful.

“The High Court proceeded on the premise that since accused Nos. 1 to 5 lacked title over the property, execution of the Power of Attorney and institution of civil proceedings amounted to forgery. In our opinion, the approach of the High Court is legally unsustainable. The essential ingredient of forgery under Section 463 of the IPC is the making of a “false document” within the meaning of Section 464 of the IPC. It is not the case of respondent No. 2 that the signatures appearing on the Power of Attorney were forged or fabricated and it is not alleged that the executants were impersonated or that the document was fabricated by someone pretending to be another person.”, the Court observed.

In terms of the aforesaid, the appeal was allowed, and the forgery case was quashed.

Also From Judgment: Filing Of Second Complaint With Material Improvements Raises Doubts: Supreme Court Quashes FIR

Cause Title: BHIKHUBHAI GOVINDBHAI PATEL & ANR. VERSUS THE STATE OF GUJARAT & ANR.

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