Mahmood v. State of U.P.
(1976) AIR SC 69
Anshit Aggarwal
1st Year LL.B
Symbiosis Law School, Pune.
Facts of the case:
Deceased was a person from the village Gurgaon, Police Station Nigohi, who used to lend the money to the villagers. He also lent the money to one of distant relative Ram Sarup and one day both of them went into an argument which made their relationship nervy. All this argument made Ram Sarup having hatred over the deceased. Some of the villagers where having bonfire near the house of Dwarka (The Deceased) and at that very moment, Ram Sarup along with the Mahmood (appellant), who was seen for the first time in the village came and joined the bonfire. After a few minutes they both went to Dwarka’s house and entered the house on the opening of the door by Dwarka.
On the next morning, one of the villagers went to Dwarka’s house to buy some grain, after waiting for long he found something suspicious and entered the house and found the Dwarka was dead. The case was reported to the police, during an investigation of the crime scene they found an axe full of blood and some of the fingerprints on the wooden handle of it.
Through, the statement of the villagers present a day before, Mahmood was arrested and his finger impressions were taken. The blood-stained axe was sealed and parcelled to CID Forensics.
Forensic Experts confirmed that fingerprints on blood- stained axe, had been matched with that of Mahmood.
Judgement:
The Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, passed an order dated 22-9-1975 in which appellants, appeal was being accepted, and charges under Section 452, 302 and 304 of IPC were uplifted and his conviction was set aside because as per the bench, circumstantial evidence on which the prosecutor’s case was staked, was too shaky, suspicious and was suspected of being fabricated as police didn’t take certain measures to prevent the blood -stained axe from being fabricated.
Procedural History:
Trail court convicted appellant not based on statements given by the villagers who saw Ram Sarup and the appellant entering the deceased house but based on the fingerprint report which was being generated by the CID experts stating that fingerprints collected from the murder weapon had matched with that of the fingerprints of the appellant.
Then, the appellant further appealed before The Hon’ble High Court, in which order passed by the trial court was being affirmed based on the fingerprint report stating that guilt on the behalf of the appellant can be affirmed through the circumstantial evidence beyond any reasonable doubt.
Furthermore, appeal was made before the Supreme Court, in which appeal was accepted and conviction was set aside.
Issue before the Court:
Issue before the Hon’ble Supreme Court was that:
Arguments by Appellant:
Arguments by Prosecution:
Rules:
The following rules where charged:
Forensic Relevance in the Case:
In a regular scenario most of us think that if the finger prints on the murder weapon match with that of the suspect, then he/she is guilt of the crime.
But in the present case, the trial court and the high court considered the fingerprint report as the main evidence and they convicted the suspect under IPC 302 and 304. Then, when appellant, appealed before the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, as argued by the appellant that when an investigating officer found the blood stained axe he did not take proper precautions to preserve the axe which can lead to the fabrication of an evidence and if proper measures were taken then why the axe reached the forensics a day after of collection, would there be the fabrication of evidence.
The Supreme Court in this regard said that, Report generated by the forensics is acceptable under section 45 of The Indian Evidence Act, but since investigating officer did not take proper measures to preserve the axe, which causes suspicion in the mind of court and it is also the general rule that the opinion of persons or the beliefs of the witness are not admissible in the court.So the Hon’ble Supreme court did not accept the forensics report as the direct source evidence is the best evidence and uplifted the order of conviction by both trial court and high court.
Analysis of The Judgement
Law Commission of India:
According to 185th report of the Law Commissions of India in the year 2006 “ “When the court has to form an opinion upon a point of foreign law, or of science or art, or as to the identity of handwriting or finger impression or footprint or palm impression or typewriting or usage of trade or technical terms or identity of person animal, the opinion, upon that point of persons specially skilled in such foreign law, science or art, or as to the identity of handwriting, typewriting, finger impression, footprint, palm impression, usage of trade, technical terms or identity of person or animal, as the case may be, are relevant facts such person called experts”
The above suggestion proposed by the Law Commissions has not materialized as Section 45 of The Indian Evidence Act was considered as best at the point of time.
Judicial Analysis:
In Case of Madan Gopal Kakkad v. Naval Dubey, the Supreme Court held that a medical witness called in as an expert and the medical officer’s testimony was in fact an advisory character based on the symptoms contained in the test and the expert witnesses are expected to present to the court all the material including the evidence that led him to come to the conclusion and to explain the terms of the science so that, while not an expert, the court the make its own decisions on those materials after giving due consideration to the expert’s opinion, since once the expert ‘s opinion is accepted, the medical officer’s opinion is not but that of court.
In Raghbir Singh v. State of Punjab, “The Apex Court noted that science-oriented crime detention is a major police initiative because, in our technical age, nothing more primitive can be conceived of than denying scientific innovations as aids to crime suppression and nothing crueler can obstruct forensic performance than merely swearing traditional oral evidence, thereby barring the liberal use of scientific evidence.”
In Kashinath G. Jami v. Speaker and Ammini v. State of Kerala, “the court held that the evidence provided by the forensic science laboratory was reliable only if the report is signed by the Joint Director of the Forensic Laboratory”
In S. Gopal Reddy v. State of A.P, it was held that the expert ‘s evidence is a very poor form of evidence and is usually not considered by the courts to provide “conclusive” proof and thus secure to rely on the same without seeking independent and reliable endorsement.
In Pawan Kumar v. State of Haryana, “Forensic evidence for the conviction of the accused was recognized as valid. The court has shown a positive disposition towards accepting the expert’s opinion when determining cases”
On drawing the analysis from the above cited case, the author is of opinion the judgment in the present case is contradictory to the above case laws as in the above said matters, the expert’s opinion i.e. evidence by the forensic laboratory was considered as valid. But in State v. Pali Ram, “where the judges reluctantly gave their own opinion to that of the experts”.
It still makes a question of doubt in the mind of the author whether forensic evidence to be considered as valid opinion in the court of law or not as finger impressions of the person remain same from the birth of a person till the death and two people cannot have the same finger print impression so expert’s opinion in this regard should generally be given more value. Expert testimony must be used not as a piece of definitive factual proof but as a piece of corroborative (tender to confirm) testimony to other facts in the case. The court is not bound to necessarily recognize an expert’s opinion, but the basis on which he gives his opinion will add meaning to the facts. As for the probative value of a fingerprint expert’s opinion, it has to have the same validity as any other expert’s opinion, such as a medical officer, etc. The proof is in each case merely a reference to the court to direct its attention to determining its importance. It is not safe to convict a person of a serious crime on the basis of thumbmarks alone and entirely, without any other corroborative evidence.
Legislative Analysis:
The identification of Prisoners Act,1920 is the law which is very important to mention here as it deals with the prescribed form of recording of fingerprints. The act provides that every person:
According to Section 5 of The Identification of Prisoners Act, first class magistrate can only order the person, if satisfied for purpose of investigation under the code of criminal procedure to give finger prints, then that person has to be present at the date and time given by the magistrate or if the person is already in police custody has to be produced before the magistrate first class.
According to the author, since in the present case while taking the fingerprint impressions of the appellant the investigating officer did not took the permission of the magistrate first class although the appellant was in the police custody, which is in the violation of the law i.e. Section 5 of The Identification of Prisoners Act. So, the investigation officer should be punished and it also creates the suspicion in the mind why the investigating officer did not produce the appellant before the magistrate, rather he took him in his custody and forcefully took fingerprint impression of the appellant on some round wooden thing.
International Comparison:
Based on the comparison of the provisions regarding expert witness in the U.S., England
and Indian laws, it is clear that both the US and the England are broad and far more wide.
They include any matter for expert opinion, unlike India.
“In England, courts have barely accepted any expert opinion on human behaviour, reactions and emotions. This is because of the belief that previous knowledge is necessary to recognize most human behavioural problem”.
In James Victor Salem v. United State Lines Company, it was pointed out that expert evidence could be excluded and deemed unnecessary by the trial judge if the facts and issues of the case could be properly explained to the jury and the facts were commonly understood and the jury could decide on the basis thereof.
But in the case of R v. Robinson this rule was criticized and little bit of relaxed in England for lack of professional opinion on human behaviour and psychology.
According the author, the law which is not in effect in India is usually a foreign statute. It gets to be a matter of fact. But personal laws are not international law and only the Judges can view them and this is because they are laws of land. Hence, in these situations, the experts’ opinion would be meaningless.
Recommendations and Suggestions:
Conclusion:
With the assistance of this research aid a variety of cases is resolved. However, there are certain circumstances or cases under which it can be argued that this technical assistance does not benefit the investigation agency as offenders are more knowledgeable and aware of the techniques of forensic and fingerprint. When the question emerges before the court whether or not the forensic evidence which is produced before the court is accurate. With the forensic expert’s view on the subject, the court must decide the issue. Since a forensic specialist has forensic science expertise and can give his best view on the forensic science-related matter. Fingerprints play a significant role in making a person recognizable. All courts of law have now acknowledged the identities of the finger impressions. Furthermore, fingerprints are widely used by government institutions, employers and police departments around the world because there are no two identical fingerprints. There are many examples of case laws pertaining to forensic evidence, in which the court judges the case on account of the advice provided by the forensic specialist and preserves human rights.
References:
Cases
Ammini v. State of Kerala, (1998) AIR SC 260
Aziz Bano v. Mohammad Ibrahim Husain, 89 Ind Cas 690
James Victor Salem v. United State Lines Company, (1962) 8 L.Ed.2d 313
Madan Gopal Kakkad v. Naval Dubey, (1992) 3 SCC 204
Pawan Kumar v. State of Haryana, (2001) AIR SC 1324
R v. Robinson, (1994) 3 All ER 346
Raghbir Singh v. State of Punjab, (1976) AIR SC 91
State v. Pali Ram, (1979) AIR SC 14
Statutes
The Indian Evidence Act, Section 45
The Code of Criminal Procedure, Section 118
The Identification of Prisoners Act, Section 3
The Identification Prisoners Act 1920, Section 5
The Indian Penal Code 1806, Section 302
The Indian Penal Code 1806, Section 452
Bibliography:
