Hostile Witness's Credible Evidence Can Form Basis For Conviction In Criminal Trial: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court observed that credible evidence even of a hostile witnesses can form the basis for conviction in a criminal trial.

Even if the witnesses have turned hostile, their evidence can be accepted, if they are natural and independent witnesses and have no reason to falsely implicate the accused, the three judges bench headed by Justice L. Nageswara Rao said.

The court added that the evidence of such witnesses cannot be treated as effaced or washed off the record altogether.

The bench was considering a case of honour killing. The Trial Court had sentenced some of the accused to death. The High Court commuted the death sentence to life imprisonment 'till their last breath'.

In this case, the evidence of one of the eye witnesses was initially recorded on 09.04.1992. She has narrated the sequence of events and the involvement of the accused in the crime. Thereafter, due to an interim order passed by the High Court, the trial was stayed for a period of six years. When she was recalled to depose in Trial Court on 21.02.1998, she turned hostile. She was later declared hostile along with 11 other prosecution witnesses.

The bench also comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna and BR Gavai said that the evidence of prosecution witnesses cannot be rejected in toto merely because the prosecution chose to treat them as hostile and cross- examined them. The reasons for her turning hostile are understandable as she comes from a lower-strata of the society, living in a village dominated by the caste to which the accused persons belong, the court noted.

The bench, in this context, observed:

"The evidence of such witnesses cannot be treated as effaced or washed off the record altogether but the same can be accepted to the extent that their version is found to be dependable on a careful scrutiny thereof . It is for the Judge of fact to consider in each case whether as a result of such cross-examination and contradiction, the witness stands thoroughly discredited or can still be believed in regard to a part of his testimony. If the Judge finds that in the process, the credit of the witness has not been completely shaken, he may, after reading and considering the evidence of the witness, as a whole, with due caution and care, accept, in the light of the other evidence on the record, that part of testimony which he finds to be creditworthy and act upon it"

In this case, the bench observed that the Courts below were right in placing reliance on the testimony of the witnesses who is also a reliable witness, for the conviction of the accused persons even after she was declared hostile. The court also said that the implementation of the Witness Protection Scheme at the time when the witnesses were deposing in the present case, would have prevented the prosecution witnesses from turning hostile.

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