Circumstances that lead to proof of quilt should be put to accused under Section 313 Cr. PC

Circumstances that lead to proof of quilt should be put to accused under Section 313 Cr. PC

 The SC in Vikramjit Singh @ Vicky v. state of Punjab, Cr. Appeal. No. 1459 of 2005 reiterated that circumstances that according to the prosecution, lead to proof should be put to the accused under examination.

In this case the prosecution witnesses turned hostile. The court responded thus:

“It may be an act of dishonesty on their part as contended by Mrs. Kochar but by reason thereof only we cannot hold the appellant quilty of commission of a heinous offence. In view of their statements in the cross-examination giving a complete go bye to what had been stated in the examination-in-chief, it is not possible to rely even upon a part of their statement.

It is now a well-settled principle of law that the circumstances which according to the prosecution lead to proof of the quilt against the accused must be put to him in his examination under Section 313 of the Code of Criminal Procedure”

(Vikramjit Singh @ Vicky v. state of Punjab, Cr. Appeal. No. 1459 of 2005, decided on November 24, 2006)