Supreme Court on Appreciation of Evidence by Interested Witnesses

State Rep. by Inspector of Police v. Saravanan & Anr. (Criminal Appeal No. 832 of 2002). Date of Judgement 14-10-08
Available at http://judis.nic.in/supremecourt/chejudis.asp

The court has reiterated two principles with regard to appreciation of evidence in a criminal case; evidence of interested witnesses and minor discrepencies as well as improvements in the statements of witnesses.

10. "... There is no rule of any presumption that the evidence of a related witness will always be an interested one or that such witness will have only a hostile attitude towards the accused facing trial."

The court quotes a 1999 decision (State of Rajasthan v. Teja Ram, (1999) 3 SCC 507) to establish the principle in the present case where the witnesses are the close relatives of the deceased thus, "when any incident happens in a dwelling house, the most natural witnesses would be the inmates of that house. It is unpragmatic to ignore such natural witnesses and insist on outsiders who would not have even seen anything."

The position of appreciation of evidence with minor discrepencies is held as follows

11. "... while appreciating the evidence of a witness, minor discrepancies on trivial matters without affecting the core of the prosecution case, ought not to prompt the court to reject evidence in its entirety. Further, on the general tenor of the evidence given by the witness, the trial court upon appreciation of evidence forms an opinion about the credibility thereof, in the normal circumstances the appellate court would not be justified to review it once again without justifiable reasons. It is the totality of the situation, which has to be taken note of. Difference in some minor detail, which does not otherwise affect the core of the prosecution case, even if present, that itself would not prompt the court to reject the evidence on minor variations and discrepancies."