Published on: 13 January 2023 at 20:09 IST
Court: Supreme Court of India
Citation: Sheila Sebastian v. R. Jawaharaj (2018)
Honourable Supreme Court of India has held that Law is well settled with regard to the fact that however strong the suspicion may be, it cannot take the place of proof. It is held that strong suspicion, coincidence, grave doubt cannot take the place of proof.
Always a duty is cast upon the courts to ensure that suspicion does not take place of the legal proof. The standard of proof in a criminal trial is proof beyond reasonable doubt because the right to personal liberty of a citizen can never be taken away by the standard of preponderance of probability.
29. This case on hand is a classic example of poor prosecution and shabby investigation which resulted in the acquittal of the accused. The investigating officer is expected to be diligent while discharging his duties. He has to be fair, transparent and his only endeavour should be to find out the truth.
The investigating officer has not even taken bare minimum care to find out the whereabouts of the imposter who executed the PoA. The evidence on record clearly reveals that PoA was not executed by the complainant and the beneficiary is the accused, still the accused could not be convicted.
The laches in the lopsided investigation goes to the root of the matter and fatal to the case of prosecution. If this is the coordination between the prosecution and the investigating agency, every criminal case tend to end up in acquittal.
In the process, the common man will lose confidence on the criminal justice delivery system, which is not a good symptom.
It is the duty of the investigating officer, prosecution as well as the courts to ensure that full and material facts and evidence are brought on record, so that there is no scope for miscarriage of justice.
Drafted By Abhijit Mishra