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The Supreme Court has held that even the version of a single witness, if his testimony is found reliable by the Court, can be the foundation of an order of conviction.

A bench of Justices Uday Umesh Lalit and Ajay Rastogi remarked so while hearing an appeal filed by the state of Rajasthan and the informant Sunil challenging the acquittal of 11 accused persons by the Division Bench of the High Court vide its judgment and final order dated December 4, 2018.

13 persons, i.e. 11 acquitted accused and 2 convicted accused were tried in Sessions Case before the the Trial Court in respect of offences punishable under Sections 147, 148, 149, 450 or 450/149, 452 or 452/149, 302 or 302 read with Sections 149, 307 or 307 read with 149 of the IPC.

The trial court had convicted all the 13 accused after relying on the medical evidence on record and eyewitness account of 6 prosecution witnesses led by the Prosecution, which was found by the Trial Court to be trustworthy.

All 13 convicted accused, being aggrieved, preferred a criminal appeal. The High Court affirmed the conviction and sentence recorded against Rajendra alias Tanti and Janak Singh, but acquitted the other 11 accused persons of the charges levelled against them.

The Top Court found that nothing was brought on record before the High Court to discredit the presence of the prosecution witnesses who were examined as eyewitnesses to the occurrence, except the submission that the presence of eyewitness Narain alias Jainarayan was not spoken to or adverted by another eyewitness Prakash @ Kalu.

"The fact that one of these witnesses had suffered injuries in the transaction and the rest of them had taken the deceased as well as the injured to medical center immediately after the occurrence lends credibility to the case of the prosecution unfolded through these eyewitnesses. Nothing has been brought on record in their cross-examinations to dislodge the credibility of these witnesses.", noted the bench.

It was further added that even if, the testimony of Narain alias Jainarayan was eschewed as his presence was not adverted to, it still left the court with 5 eyewitnesses who had testified to the presence and participation of the accused-respondents.

With this view the court remarked that in the face of such clear, consistent and cogent evidence on record, the High Court was not justified in proceeding on the basis that the eyewitnesses had not named other accused in specific terms or entertaining any doubt and then recording order of acquittal.

"The approach of the High Court was completely against the settled principles of law and no valid reasons were given by the High Court as to why the evidence of all the eyewitnesses could not be relied upon in so far as the role played by the acquitted accused was concerned. We find the order of acquittal recorded by the High Court to be completely unjust and its conclusion to be totally against the record", held the Court.

Accordingly, the order of conviction against the original accused, as passed by the trial court, was restored.

Cause Title: STATE OF RAJASTHAN v BABLU @ OM PRAKASH