Murder -- Circumstantial Evidence -- Conviction cannot rest on broken chain of circumstances
(i) Indian Penal Code, 1860, S.302 -- Murder -- Circumstantial Evidence -- Every circumstance must be fully established and consistent only with guilt of accused -- Circumstances must be conclusive and must exclude every other hypothesis -- Court cannot supply a missing link by conjecture or suspicion -- Forensic reports that do not connect accused to the crime weaken the chain. (ii) Indian Penal Code, 1860, S.302 -- Murder -- Last Seen Together -- Theory applies only where time gap between last seen and death is so small that no other person could be the author of the crime -- Long gap, with chance of other persons coming in, makes a finding of guilt on this basis hazardous without other positive evidence. (iii) Indian Evidence Act, 1872, S.27 -- Evidence -- Recovery from Place Visible to Public -- Test is whether the place was ordinarily visible to others, not whether it was accessible -- Recovery from an open place used by villagers and cattle herders must be viewed with caution. (iv) Criminal Procedure Code, 1973, S.313 -- Evidence -- Statement of Accused -- Answers of accused cannot fill gaps left by prosecution evidence -- Statement is not substantive evidence and cannot replace proof by the prosecution -- Adverse inference arises only where incriminating circumstances are already proved by independent evidence.
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