Presumption of innocence

Control of Narcotic Substances Act (XXV of 1997) [as amended by the Control of Narcotic Substances (Amendment) Act, 2022], S. 9(i)(3)(b)

Possession of narcotic substance

Pre-arrest bail, grant of

Presumption of innocence

Every accused is presumed to be blue eyed boy of law until and unless he is found guilty of alleged charge and law cannot be stretched upon in favour of prosecution particularly at bail stage.

Involvement of an accused in a heinous offence is not sufficient to convict him as the accused continues with presumption of innocence until found guilty at the end of the trial

Prosecution is bound to establish its case against the accused beyond shadow of any reasonable doubt by producing confidence inspiring and trustworthy evidence.

Approach for dealing with the appeal against conviction would be different and distinguishable from the appeal against acquittal because presumption of double innocence of accused is attached to the order of acquittal.

Plea raised by petitioner was despite repeated appearances, National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had been calling him time and again due to mala fide reasons

Validity

High Court while exercising its Constitutional jurisdiction was to see whether or not there was anymala fide on the part of NAB authorities to arrest accused and whether or not a prima facie case for grant of extra ordinary concession of admitting him to bail before arrest was made out

If Constitutional Court in the light of record had reached to the conclusion that mala fide was reflected from intended NAB's move to arrest accused and latter also succeeded in setting up a prima facie case in his favour then in such like situation, it was primary duty and legal obligation of Court to grant relief to the citizen so that he could be protected from unjust and arbitrary arrest

If despite element of mala fide on the part of NAB to nab accused, the latter was not admitted to bail before arrest and allowed to be grilled by the former's investigators for maximum period of 90 days by putting him behind the bars then centuries old jurisprudence developed by Courts of law regarding presumption of innocence of accused unless proven guilty would die down and would be meaningless

In response to various call up notices, petitioner appeared before Combined Investigation Team and presented before it his point of view regarding allegations pertaining to accumulation of assets beyond his known sources of income

Reply so submitted by petitioner to Combined Investigation Team was documented one and it would be seen by the relevant forum whether plea of accused and his defence was correct or otherwise

Petitioner had prima facie answered through documents all queries of NAB put to him through numerous call up notices

Apart from responding to NAB's queries through various documents, he was regularly attending High Court and did not misuse his interim order whereby ad-interim bail before arrest was granted to him which aspect could not be overlooked while deciding bail application

Bail was allowed, in circumstances.

Involvement of an accused in heinous nature of offence is not sufficient to convict him as the accused continues with presumption of innocence until found guilty at the end of the trial, for which the prosecution is bound to establish the case against the accused beyond any shadow of reasonable doubt by producing confidence inspiring and trustworthy evidence.

Order of acquittal could only be interfered with when it was found on the face of it as capricious, perverse, arbitrary in nature or based on misreading, non-appraisal of evidence or was artificial and led to gross miscarriage of justice.

Taking of cognizance even by a competent court of law never turns the accused guilty but the accused continues to enjoy the presumption of innocence until found guilty after trial.

Interference in appeal against acquittal is the most narrow and limited because in an acquittal presumption of innocence significantly adds to cardinal rule of criminal jurisprudence that an accused is presumed to be innocent until proved guilty

Presumption of innocence is doubled and Courts are very slow in interfering with such an acquittal judgment unless it is shown to be perverse, passed in gross violation of law, suffering from errors of grave misreading or non-reading of evidence

Such judgments should not be lightly interfered and heavy burden lies on prosecution to rebut presumption of innocence which accused has earned and attained on account of his acquittal.

Accused can not be held guilty on the basis of proved absconsion as it is not a substitute to the incriminating evidence.

Accused would be presumed to be a blue eyed boy of law until and unless he is found guilty of the charge.

Such presumption continues to be operative until the prosecution is able to prove its case through reliable trustworthy and confidence inspiring evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.

Heinous nature of offence is not sufficient to convict accused as accused continues with presumption of innocence until found guilty at the end of trial

Prosecution is bound to establish case against accused beyond any shadow of reasonable doubt by producing confidence inspiring and trustworthy evidence

If a single circumstance creates doubt in prosecution case, its benefit was to go to accused not as a matter of grace or concession but as a matter of right

Acquittal of ten guilty persons is preferred to conviction of a single innocent person

Very high standard of proof is required to establish culpability of an accused person.

Acquittal carried with it double presumption of innocence; it was reversed only when found blatantly perverse, resting upon fringes of impossibility and resulting into miscarriage of justice

Acquittal could not be set aside merely on the possibility of a contra view.

Such presumption remained throughout the case until such time the prosecution on the evidence satisfied the Court beyond reasonable doubt that the accused was guilty of the offence alleged against him.

Mere heinous nature of the offence is not sufficient to convict the accused and the accused continues with presumption of innocence until found otherwise at the end of the trial

Burden is always upon the prosecution to prove the case beyond shadow of doubt.

Mere heinous nature of offence is not sufficient to convict the accused because he continues with presumption of innocence until found otherwise at the end of trial. [Para. 9 of the judgment]

Accused earned double presumption of innocence with the acquittal, firstly, till found guilty he had to be considered innocent, and secondly, after his acquittal by Trial Court further confirmed the presumption of innocence.

Mere heinous nature of offence, was not sufficient to convict accused because, accused would continue with presumption of innocence, until found otherwise at the end of the trial.

Occurrence took place in the room of prosecution witness, but said witness was not brought before the court by the prosecution for recording his statement

Inference could be drawn that said witness was not willing to support the prosecution version

Doctor did not appear before the court for recording his statement

Statement of the Doctor was very much important and best evidence to prove the case of hurt and non-production of Doctor, would make the prosecution case doubtful

Many persons from the locality were present at the place of occurrence, but no one was cited as witness, and only the related witnesses had been cited

Enmity between the parties having been admitted, false involvement of accused person was very much there

Recovery witnesses negated the recoveries, which were brought before the court

Testimony of prosecution witnesses, though could not be discarded merely on the ground of relationship with the complainant; and conviction could be based on the statement of a solitary evidence, but in the present case, there were exaggerations in the statements of eye-witnesses; and their veracity on account of material contradictions in their statements

Independent corroboration was necessary in view of enmity with accused party

Prosecution was bound to prove the guilt of accused beyond reasonable doubt, however, when the testimony of the eye-witnesses would become doubtful, the prosecution case as a whole would become doubtful

Double presumption of innocence was available in case of acquittal one being on the general principle of law that an accused was innocent until and unless he was proved guilty; and while the other emanate from the order of acquittal passed in favour of the accused.

Presumption of double innocence of accused was attached while dealing with an appeal against acquittal.

After acquittal, accused earned double presumption of innocence, which could only be interfered with if the (acquittal) order on the face of it appeared to be perverse, arbitrary or illegal.

After acquittal the accused earned double presumption of innocence.

Presumption of double innocence of accused was attached while dealing with an appeal against acquittal.

Police might collect incriminating material against the accused during the course of investigation but presumption of innocence still remained in favour of the accused, unless he was tried, convicted and sentenced by a court of competent court.

Every accused is blue eyed child of law and is presumed to be innocent unless and until he is held guilty by due course of law.

Presumption of innocence is attached with an accused after acquitted.

Presumption of innocence was attached to every accused, but after acquittal, accused was clothed with double presumption of innocence

Principle laid down in connection with appeal against acquittal, were different, from appeal against conviction

Different parameters were applied for interference in an appeal against the acquittal and appeal against conviction

Appellate Court would not interfere, unless conclusion reached by courts below was not supported by evidence on record

Principles.

Onus rests on prosecution to prove guilt of accused beyond a reasonable doubt throughout the trial and it never shifts to accused except in cases falling under Art. 121 of Qanun-e-Shahadat, 1984, but it is inextricably linked to presumption of innocence of accused

Presumption of innocence 'remains throughout the case until such time, the prosecution on the evidence satisfies the Court/Judge beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused is guilty

Two concepts i.e., "proof beyond reasonable doubt" and "presumption of innocence" are so closely linked together that the same must be presented as a unit

Presumption of innocence is the golden thread of criminal justice then proof beyond a reasonable doubt is silver and these two threads are forever interwined in the fabric of criminal justice

As such the expression "proof beyond reasonable doubt" is of fundamental importance to criminal justice system; it is one of the principles, which seeks to ensure that no innocent person is convicted

There cannot be a fair trial, which is the goal of criminal justice, if Judges have not clearly understood the basic and fundamentally important concept of standard of proof that prosecution must meet in order to obtain a conviction.