JUDGMENT Roxburgh, J. - The accused, B.C. Das, is being tried on three charges u/s 471 read with Section 467 of the Indian Penal Code. After some witnesses had been examined, a question arose as to whether the committing Magistrate could have taken cognisance of the complaint in the case or whether the proceedings could Only be initiated by a complaint from the Judge of this Court. After hearing learned Standing Counsel I am of the opinion that the proceedings are bad, that a complaint by a Judge of this Court was necessary: therefore, this Court has no jurisdiction to proceed further with the case and the only order that can be passed is that the accused be discharged from his bond on the ground that the proceedings so far are a nullity. I proceed to give my reasons. 2. The accused is the managing director of the Suburban Bank, Ltd. The bank stopped payment on March 19, 1948. On March 23, the bank filed a petition in this Court proposing a scheme u/s 153 of the Indian Companies Act. The petition was signed For Suburban Bank, Ltd., B.C. Das, Managing "Director" and B.C. Das as managing director gave an affidavit verifying the petition. Amongst other matters, said to be true to his knowledge, are those contained in para. 11 of the petition, which included a statement that the good and realisable assets of the company would come to over 35 lakhs, the particulars of the assets appearing in the statement marked "A" attached to the petition. In that petition, under the head "Assets", is an item "Loans unsecured--Rs. 9,50,000". 3. An order was passed by Das J., directing, amongst other matters, that Mr. N.C. Chakrabarti, Registered Accountant, be appointed auditor to report as to the workability of the scheme of arrangement proposed. Directions were also given for the Applicant to convene meetings. 4. Some meetings were held. Then, on May 12, a petition was filed by Bhubaneshwar Prasad Dube and Saroj Kumar Datta as representing a committee of shareholders and creditors of the company and also in their individual capacities, praying that the company be wound-up and making various allegations against the managing director. 4. Some meetings were held. Then, on May 12, a petition was filed by Bhubaneshwar Prasad Dube and Saroj Kumar Datta as representing a committee of shareholders and creditors of the company and also in their individual capacities, praying that the company be wound-up and making various allegations against the managing director. An ex -parte provisional order was passed admitting the petition, appointing the Official Receiver of the Court as interim provisional liquidator, directing him to take possession of the books of account of the company and to make an inventory of the monies. On the following day, a petition was filed by the bank signed "For and on behalf of the "Suburban Bank, Ltd., B.C. Das, Managing Director" verified by an affidavit by B.C. Das, objecting to the order passed, alleging, amongst other things, that the Applicants to the petition had made it to obtain preferential treatment and to prevent the auditor from submitting his report, adding that if the Provisional Liquidator were appointed, this would have a bad effect on the share-holders and creditors and the object for reviving the company by the proposed scheme would be frustrated. The prayer was to review the application u/s 153 of the Act and to stay the winding-up proceedings. On May 25, order was passed that Mr. N.C. Chakrabarti, Provisional Liquidator, was to take possession of the books of account and of the assets of the company and the notice of the winding-up petition was to be advertised and was fixed for hearing after the vacation. Finally, on July 20, 1948, an order for winding-up the company was made. 5. The prosecution case is that, on August 17 or 18, after various tagids by Mr. Chakrabarti, the liquidator, the accused produced as good assets of the bank nine promissory notes for a sum of four lakhs seventy thousand which are said to be forged. Three of these form the subject-matter of the present charges. 6. Two questions arise in view of the provisions of Section 195(1)(c) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The charges against the accused are that, on August 17--18, 1948, namely, when he handed over these alleged forged promissory notes to the liquidator, he used them fraudulently or dishonestly, knowing or having reason to believe them to be forged. The questions are then-- 1. The charges against the accused are that, on August 17--18, 1948, namely, when he handed over these alleged forged promissory notes to the liquidator, he used them fraudulently or dishonestly, knowing or having reason to believe them to be forged. The questions are then-- 1. Was this offence of user committed by the accused, he being a party to proceedings in any court? and 2. Was the offence in each case in respect of a document produced in such proceeding? The proceeding in court was the winding-up proceeding. In the course of that, under the directions of the court, the liquidator took charge of the pro-notes. 7. We may first dispose of the latter question. In my opinion, the alleged user by the accused was made in a judicial proceeding, namely, the liquidation proceeding. Mr. Khaitan has cited one case, Munisamy Mudaliar v. Rajaratnam Pillai (1922) ILR 45 Mad. 928, to support a contention that the document in question must actually be produced in court, and therefore, the production by the accused to the liquidator is not sufficient. There the case related to a document which was not produced in court in the suit, but was disclosed in an affidavit filed therein and inspection was allowed to the other side. It was also filed in the office of the translator of the High Court. The facts may easily be distinguished from those in the present case. The accused, according to the prosecution, had, on March 28, filed a petition that the bank had nine and a half lakhs unsecured assets. In the later proceedings, he had been contending (in the name of the bank) that liquidation was not necessary and that the bank could tide over by the scheme suggested in his first petition. The liquidator was appointed by the Court to take charge of the assets and proceed in accordance with the Indian Companies Act and was acting on behalf of the Court. It seems to me clear that, in those circumstances, the mere fact that the accused did not personally come and make over the pro-notes alleged to be forged into the hands of a Judge of the Court is immaterial, he was clearly producing them in a stage of the liquidation proceeding which was a judicial proceeding before the Court. 8. It seems to me clear that, in those circumstances, the mere fact that the accused did not personally come and make over the pro-notes alleged to be forged into the hands of a Judge of the Court is immaterial, he was clearly producing them in a stage of the liquidation proceeding which was a judicial proceeding before the Court. 8. The other question is whether the accused is a party to the proceeding within the meaning of the word as used in Section 195(1)(c) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Some cases have been cited before me in which it has been held that, for example, a guardian-ad-litem is not a party to a civil suit and by analogy it is urged that the accused cannot be held to be a party to the liquidation proceeding so as to claim the protection given by Section 195(1)(c) of the Code. The only case of this Court cited is Probhatranjan Barat v. Umashankar Chatterji (1930) ILR 58 Cal. 727, 733. There a complaint had been made against a caveator in a will case and against an attorney who attested the will and one Bhattacharjya, who was in effect a witness. Rankin C.J. (as he then was) remarked-- I am not prepared to give any unusual or extended meaning to the phrase "party to any proceeding" in Clause (c). The Appellant Shibapada made an affidavit of due execution of the alleged will set up by Prabhat, when the script was brought into Court in May, 1928, but a witness is not a party. That-- a managing director is not strictly a party to a pleading in a suit by a company and therefore, it follows that as regards every pleading on behalf of the company or corporation the fitness to verify of the person purporting to verify it must be proved by affidavit. was held by Buckland J. in International Continental Caoutchoue Compagnie v. Mehta and Co. (1927) 31 C.W.N. 1030. 9. The question then is,--Are we giving any unusual or extended meaning to the phrase "party to any proceeding", if we hold that the present accused was a party to the liquidation proceeding. was held by Buckland J. in International Continental Caoutchoue Compagnie v. Mehta and Co. (1927) 31 C.W.N. 1030. 9. The question then is,--Are we giving any unusual or extended meaning to the phrase "party to any proceeding", if we hold that the present accused was a party to the liquidation proceeding. The actual case considered by Rankin C.J. was the case of a witness and it would certainly require a very definitely unusual and very extended meaning to be given to the word "party" to make it cover a witness; the word would have to be used with no technical connotation whatever, as merely covering any person who had something to do in some way with proceedings before the court. But, in my respectful opinion, we are to look at the object of the provisions of Section 195(1)(c) and we are to interpret the word there used having regard to the whole section. The difficulty I feel in accepting the cases, where what may be called the strictly rigid civil procedure interpretation of the word "party" is taken, is that it overlooks the whole context of Section 195(1)(c) and if by analogy the same reasoning is applied, for example, to cases before a criminal court, the effect is to nullify entirely the protection there given, at any rate as it affects the prosecution side. A complainant in a criminal case is not strictly speaking a party to the criminal proceeding. The prosecutor is always the Crown, though in some cases a complainant is allowed to conduct the proceedings. In the present case Bhubaneshwar Prasad Dube and Saroj Datta for example, though complainants and initiators of the proceedings are not parties and if, for example, the present case were substantially based on some alleged forged papers produced by them, there would be no protection, according to the strict view, from their prosecution, in the event that the case happened to go in favour of the present accused and he desired to prosecute them; although it might be that, for example, the Judge in the case might think that the jury rightly had given the benefit of the doubt to the accused, certainly it was no proper case for the complainants to be prosecuted for using the documents. Section 195, by its very nature, is made to cover a wide field. Section 195, by its very nature, is made to cover a wide field. The word "court" is given a special definition and includes any civil, criminal or revenue court, but does not go as far as covering the District Registrar or Sub-Registrar. The word "party" clearly, if it is to have any effect as regards criminal courts, cannot be given the strict meaning appropriate in ordinary civil cases. Mr. Khaitan, while conceding the force of this argument, urged that, at any rate, when the word "party" was being interpreted with reference to civil proceedings, then the strictest view as laid down in cases dealing with civil matters should be followed. The contention, with due respect, does not seem to me to be logical. The purpose of Section 195(7)(c) is well known and obvious. It is to protect parties who move a court from being harassed by others who consider themselves aggrieved, particularly ii those others happen to be successful in a dispute before the court with regard to a particular document. The principles are often considered and applied when applications u/s 476 of the Code of Criminal Procedure are made or orders made thereunder are the subject of appeal. In the present case, the only one, if the prosecution case is correct, who has been trying to deceive the court, is the present accused and in the course of his conduct of the proceedings, according to prosecution, he made use of the alleged forged documents in the liquidation proceeding by making them over to the liquidator. It seems to me that, on any fair and reasonable view of Section 195(2)(c), a view consistent with the view, which must be held, as I have indicated, in order to make the section have any meaning in relation to criminal cases, the accused was a party to liquidation proceedings within the meaning of the word as used in Section 195(7)(c). In form, he moved in the name of the company, but the company could only act through some human being in the matter and that human being, I think, in the circumstances, if the allegation is that, in the course of so acting, he has committed an offence referred to in Section 195(2)(c) and is entitled to the protection there given. 10. Before leaving the matter, I may briefly refer to the cases cited in addition to the Calcutta case already mentioned. 10. Before leaving the matter, I may briefly refer to the cases cited in addition to the Calcutta case already mentioned. In Emperor Vs. Mallappa Tejappa Bidikar, AIR 1937 Bom 14 , Broomfield J. held that the word does not include the guardian or next friend of a minor. He relied on the observations of Rankin C.J. already quoted above, without commenting that the extended meaning contended for in that case was that the word was so loosely employed as to be able to cover a witness, whereas the question for consideration in the Bombay case was whether the person conducting the case, the person, really responsible for the conduct of the case, was covered by the word "party", although no doubt, under the strict interpretation of the word as used in matters of civil procedure, a guardian was not a party. In re Rayalla Ramappa ILR (1945) , Byers J. followed the Bombay case. He also relied on a Madras case Marti Satyanarayana v. Gujavarii Anjareddi ILR (1941) Mad. 985 and held that a guardian-ad-litem was not a party within the meaning of Section 195(1)(c) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The Madras case of 1941 was purely a case relating to the interpretation to be given to Section 95 of the Code of Civil Procedure, the question being whether the summary procedure for compensation therein could be had in favour of a Defendant against the next friend. The learned Judges pointed out that the word used in Section 95 was "Plaintiff" and the next friend, not being the Plaintiff, could not be covered, and in any case, the Defendant could bring a regular suit for damages against the next friend. It seems to me that, as I have already suggested, in reference to a decision of Buckland J. in relation to company matters, that it is not safe or sound to argue from decisions laid down in the more technical sphere of Civil Procedure and apply the same to the question as to what persons are protected u/s 195(7)(c), of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The case Emperor v. Kushal Pal Singh (1931) ILR 53 All. 804, was also referred to by Mr. Khaitan in argument. In my opinion, it is of no assistance in the present matter, the facts there being very peculiar. The case Emperor v. Kushal Pal Singh (1931) ILR 53 All. 804, was also referred to by Mr. Khaitan in argument. In my opinion, it is of no assistance in the present matter, the facts there being very peculiar. The alleged forger was a Defendant and had forged the documents, if at all, many years previous to the suit. The documents were put in by the Plaintiff. Hence it was held that the word "party" in the section was to be interpreted in the sense "party as such". The alleged forger was liable for prosecution quite independently of the suit; the question was whether he had attained a fortuitous protection from prosecution because somebody else had happened to produce the documents in the proceeding in which he happened to be a party. Clearly Section 195(1)(c) was not framed with intent to cover such a case and the learned Judges had no real difficulty in holding that in fact it did not do so; but, as I have said, neither the decision nor the reasoning appears to be of any assistance in the present case. 11. The result is that I am of opinion that the accused Bankim Chandra Das was a party to the liquidation proceeding before this Court within the meaning of the word as used in Section 195(7)(c) and the prosecution case here is that the offence of user charged was committed in respect of a document which was used by him in producing it in such proceeding, and therefore, no court can take cognisance of the offence without a complaint from this Court. In the absence of such complaint, the proceedings in the lower court were null and void and consequently the present proceedings are equally null and void and for these reasons, as I have already stated, the only order I can pass and do pass is to discharge the accused from his bond, on the ground that I have no jurisdiction to do anything else.