The accused’s confession cannot be proved under the Evidence Act S.27, only statements of disclosure of facts are admissible: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court explained that in accordance with Art. 27 of the Evidence Act, only that part of the accused’s testimony is admissible which is directly related to the discovery/recovery of evidence and that the accused’s confession cannot be taken into account in proving guilt. Statement under Art. 27. The Court held that inadmissible parts of such statements could not be taken into account in the examination-in-chief of a prosecution witness.

A bench consisting of Justices Abhay S. Oka, Ahsanuddin Amanullah and AG Masih expressed concern about the impact on trial courts if such inadmissible testimony was taken into account.

In this case (a murder appeal), the defendant allegedly made statements about where the body was disposed of. However, the interrogation of the chief investigating officer included the accused’s confession of involvement in the murder.

The Court noted that the investigating officer attempted to substantiate the statements allegedly made by the accused to the police officers, which was unacceptable.

“There is a complete ban on even proving such testimony. The learned trial judge completely lost sight of Art. 25 and 26 of the Evidence Act and allowed PW-27 to prove the statement allegedly given by the accused during his stay in police custody “ The Court noted.

Justice OKin the judgment he criticized this practice, emphasizing that the first-instance court should not have included the inadmissible testimony in the testimony. Pursuant to Art. 27 of the Evidence Act, only that part of the accused’s testimony is admissible which directly leads to the establishment of facts in police custody.

‘Only such information supplied by the accused as clearly relates to the facts thus discovered is admissible. No other part is allowed. Exhibits “P55” and “P56” allege that the accused indicated the places where the deceased was abducted, the place where he was murdered and the place where his body was dumped. In the present case, even the inadmissible part of the declaration under Art. 27 of the Evidence Act was covered by the examination-in-chief of PW-27. The learned trial judge should not have recorded the inadmissible statement in his evidence. Statements made by the accused to a police officer in custody are not admissible as evidence except in cases where Art. 27. If such inadmissible statements become part of the testimony of prosecution witnesses, there is every possibility that it will influence the trial courts“, said the court.

Since the entire prosecution case was based on circumstantial evidence which was not proved beyond reasonable doubt and the chain of events was not established to convict the accused, hence the court acquitted the accused of the charges of abduction and murder under the IPC.

Therefore, the appeal was allowed.

Case Title: RANDEEP SINGH @ RANA and ANR. vs. STATE OF HARYANA AND ORS.

Citation: 2024 LiveLaw (SC) 914

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