Confessions of co-accused not substantive evidence: SC

Trial courts must first look into other evidences, says apex court

A bench of justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana Prakash Desai said the trial court cannot begin on the basis of the  confession of the co-accused to form its opinion in a case.

“In dealing with a case against an accused, the court cannot start with the confession of a co-accused; it must begin with other evidence adduced by the prosecution and after it has formed its opinion with regard to the quality and effect of the said evidence, then it is permissible to turn to the confession in order to receive assurance to the conclusion of guilt which the judicial mind is about to reach on the said other evidence,” the Bench said.

Referring to previous apex court verdicts, the court said it is not obligatory to take the confession into account.

“This court reiterated that a confession cannot be treated as substantive evidence against a co-accused. Where the prosecution relies upon the confession of one accused against another, the proper approach is to consider the other evidence against such an accused. If the said evidence appears to be satisfactory and the court is inclined to hold that the evidence may sustain the charge framed against the accused, the court turns to the confession with a view to assuring itself that the conclusion which it is inclined to draw from the other evidence is right.”

Generic sense

“This court clarified that though confession may be regarded as evidence in generic sense because of the provisions in the Indian Evidence Act, the fact remains that it is not evidence (in strict sense) as defined in the Act,” the bench said.

The court made the observations while setting aside the conviction and life term awarded to three persons—Pratham, Pancho and Gajraj—by the Punjab and Haryana High Court in the case relating to murder of one Kartar Singh in February 1999 after robbing him of his tractor.

The police could not make progress in the case until Pratham made some extra-judicial confession in August 1999 which he had retracted during the recording of his statement during the trial.

The Bench noted that there was delay in recording of extra-judicial (before someone other than court) statement. Further, retraction by the accused had also caused a dent into its credibility, the apex court said.