Vijaya Singh Vs State Of Uttarakhand 2024 INSC 905 - S 164 CrPC

Code Of Criminal Procedure - Section 164 - A statement under Section 164 CrPC cannot be discarded at the drop of a hat and on a mere statement of the witness that it was not recorded correctly. For, a judicial satisfaction of the Magistrate, to the effect that the statement being recorded is the correct version of the facts stated by the witness, forms part of every such statement and a higher burden must be placed upon the witness to retract from the same. To permit retraction by a witness from a signed statement recorded before the Magistrate on flimsy grounds or on mere assertions would effectively negate the difference between a statement recorded by the police officer and that recorded by the Judicial Magistrate. (Para 31)-

Code Of Criminal Procedure - Section 164 - A statement under Section 164, although not a substantive piece of evidence, not only meets the test of relevancy but could also be used for the purposes of contradiction and corroboration. A statement recorded under Section 164 CrPC serves a special purpose in a criminal investigation as a greater amount of credibility is attached to it for being recorded by a Judicial Magistrate and not by the Investigating Officer. A statement under Section 164 CrPC is not subjected to the constraints attached with a statement under Section 161 CrPC and the vigour of Section 162 CrPC does not apply to a statement under Section 164 CrPC. Therefore, it must be considered on a better footing. However, relevancy, admissibility and reliability are distinct concepts in the realm of the law of evidence. Thus, the weight to be attached to such a statement (reliability thereof) is to be determined by the Court on a case-to-case basis and the same would depend to some extent upon whether the witness has remained true to the statement or has resiled from it, but it would not be a conclusive factor. For, even if a witness has retracted from a statement, such retraction could be a result of manipulation and the Court has to examine the circumstances in which the statement was recorded, the reasons stated by the witness for retracting from the statement etc. Ultimately, what counts is whether the Court believes a statement to be true, and the ultimate test of reliability happens during the trial upon a calculated balancing of conflicting versions in light of the other evidence on record. (Para 28)

Criminal Trial - Mere presence of minor variations is not fatal to the case of the prosecution. It is so because a natural testimony is bound to have variations. The question is whether the variations or contradictions could be termed as fatal to the case of the prosecution. The said question needs to be answered in light of the other evidence on record by examining whether the oral testimonies have found corroboration from other evidence or have remained isolated testimonies. (Para 25)

Criminal Trial - Circumstantial Evidence - When a case is based on circumstantial evidence, the circumstances proved must point unequivocally to the guilt of the accused and must be incompatible with any theory of his being innocent. The principles governing the appreciation of circumstantial evidence - Referred to Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra (1984) 4 SCC 116: (1) the circumstances from which the conclusion of guilt is to be drawn should be fully established.(2) the facts so established should be consistent only with the hypothesis of the guilt of the accused, that is to say, they should not be explainable on any other hypothesis except that the accused is guilty, (3) the circumstances should be of a conclusive nature and tendency, (4) they should exclude every possible hypothesis except the one to be proved, and (5) there must be a chain of evidence so complete as not to leave any reasonable ground for the conclusion consistent with the innocence of the accused and must show that in all human probability the act must have been done by the accused. (Para 11)