NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has said that a person should not be convicted solely on the basis of dying declaration if there is some doubt about its veracity and acquitted a person who was convicted and sentenced to death for burning his son and two brothers to death on the basis of statements made by the deceased before dying.
A bench of Justices B R Gavai, J B Pardiwala and Prashant Kumar Mishra said that acceptability of dying declaration is high because it is done by a person at the time of death when every motive to falsehood is silenced, and the man is induced by the most powerful consideration to speak only the truth. But the bench cautioned the courts not to rely on it blindly.
“It is unsafe to record the conviction on the basis of a dying declaration alone in the cases where suspicion, like the case on hand is raised, as regards the correctness of the dying declaration. In such cases, the Court may have to look for some corroborative evidence by treating the dying declaration only as a piece of evidence. The evidence and material available on record must be properly weighed in each case to arrive at an appropriate conclusion. The reason why we say so is that in the case on hand, although the appellant-convict has been named in the two dying declarations as a person who set the room on fire, yet the surrounding circumstances render such statements of the declarants very doubtful,” the bench said.
The bench, after examining all the evidence and statements of witness and dying declarations, said that there were contradictions and it had to either believe the dying declarations or the oral evidence of the eyewitnesses. It accepted the plea of senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan who, appearing for the convict, submitted that dying declarations did not inspire any confidence and could not not be relied upon.
“It is the duty of the prosecution to establish the charge against the accused beyond reasonable doubt. The benefit of doubt must always go in favour of the accused. It is true that dying declaration is a substantive piece of evidence to be relied on provided it is proved that the same was voluntary and truthful and the victim was in a fit state of mind. It is just not enough for the court to say that the dying declaration is reliable as the accused is named in the dying declaration as the assailant,” the bench said.
A bench of Justices B R Gavai, J B Pardiwala and Prashant Kumar Mishra said that acceptability of dying declaration is high because it is done by a person at the time of death when every motive to falsehood is silenced, and the man is induced by the most powerful consideration to speak only the truth. But the bench cautioned the courts not to rely on it blindly.
“It is unsafe to record the conviction on the basis of a dying declaration alone in the cases where suspicion, like the case on hand is raised, as regards the correctness of the dying declaration. In such cases, the Court may have to look for some corroborative evidence by treating the dying declaration only as a piece of evidence. The evidence and material available on record must be properly weighed in each case to arrive at an appropriate conclusion. The reason why we say so is that in the case on hand, although the appellant-convict has been named in the two dying declarations as a person who set the room on fire, yet the surrounding circumstances render such statements of the declarants very doubtful,” the bench said.
The bench, after examining all the evidence and statements of witness and dying declarations, said that there were contradictions and it had to either believe the dying declarations or the oral evidence of the eyewitnesses. It accepted the plea of senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan who, appearing for the convict, submitted that dying declarations did not inspire any confidence and could not not be relied upon.
“It is the duty of the prosecution to establish the charge against the accused beyond reasonable doubt. The benefit of doubt must always go in favour of the accused. It is true that dying declaration is a substantive piece of evidence to be relied on provided it is proved that the same was voluntary and truthful and the victim was in a fit state of mind. It is just not enough for the court to say that the dying declaration is reliable as the accused is named in the dying declaration as the assailant,” the bench said.