Published on: 6 August 2023 at 22:50 IST
Court: Supreme Court
Citation: A.S. Krishnan V. State of Kerala (2004)
Honourable Supreme Court of India has explained the term “Reason to believe” as a person is said to have “reason to believe” a thing provided there are sufficient cause to believe that thing but not otherwise. It is held that Section 471 of Indian Penal Code 1860 has an expression “knows or has reason to believe” where in the words “knowledge” and “reason to believe” which it is held that “Knowledge” is an awareness on the part of the person concerned indicating his state of mind, thus “knowledge” is considered to be on a higher plane than “reason to believe”.
9. Under IPC, guilt in respect of almost all the offences is fastened either on the ground of “intention” or “knowledge” or “reason to believe”. We are now concerned with the expressions “knowledge” and “reason to believe”. “Knowledge” is an awareness on the part of the person concerned indicating his state of mind. “Reason to believe” is another facet of the state of mind. “Reason to believe” is not the same thing as “suspicion” or “doubt” and mere seeing also cannot be equated to believing. “Reason to believe” is a higher level of state of mind. Likewise “knowledge” will be slightly on a higher plane than “reason to believe”.
A person can be supposed to know where there is a direct appeal to his senses and a person is presumed to have a reason to believe if he has sufficient cause to believe the same. Section 26IPC explains the meaning of the words “reason to believe”.
Drafted By Abhijit Mishra