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by sayum
21 May 2026 8:25 AM
“It is inexplicable that PW-2 suppressed the conspiracy despite being the scribe of the FIR” — Supreme Court holds silence of key witness fatal to prosecution’s case. In a landmark ruling delivered on October 6, 2025, the Supreme Court of India, while acquitting three men convicted for the murder of a 10-year-old child, issued a strong warning against relying on belated and uncorroborated witness testimony, especially where the witness claims prior knowledge of a conspiracy but failed to disclose it at the earliest opportunity.
In the case titled Nazim & Ors. v. State of Uttarakhand, the Court found the conduct of PW-2, Tauhid Ali, to be highly suspect, stating that his testimony “bears all the hallmarks of an afterthought”. The witness had claimed during trial that he overheard the accused conspiring to commit the murder at a marriage feast, yet failed to mention this in the FIR, to the complainant, or to police—even though he himself had scribed the FIR immediately after the child’s body was discovered.
“A person who claims to overhear a murder plot and yet says nothing cannot be treated as a credible witness”
Rejecting the High Court’s reliance on PW-2’s testimony to establish motive and conspiracy, the Bench of Justice M.M. Sundresh and Justice Satish Chandra Sharma held:
“If indeed he had overheard an open and categorical threat to commit murder, it is inexplicable that he suppressed it from the complainant, from the police, and even from the FIR that he himself scribed.”
The Court found it implausible that a witness who allegedly overheard a plan to murder a child would treat it as “loose talk” and refrain from informing the family or the police, even after the child went missing and was later found murdered.
Discrepancy in Feast Date Exposed Testimony as Fabricated
Adding to the unreliability of PW-2’s version, the defence successfully established that the marriage feast, during which the conspiracy was allegedly discussed, did not take place on the date claimed by PW-2. Instead, defence witnesses confirmed that the event occurred a day earlier, on June 3, 2007, not June 4 as claimed.
“PW-2’s claim that he overheard the conspiracy at the feast becomes highly doubtful when the very date of the feast is disproven by independent witnesses,” the Court observed.
This chronological mismatch, coupled with PW-2’s total silence during the FIR, the search for the boy, and the recovery of the body, led the Court to conclude that his testimony could not be treated as a valid link in the chain of circumstances necessary for conviction based on circumstantial evidence.
Courts Must Scrutinize Silent Witnesses With Extra Caution
The judgment underscores a critical evidentiary principle: witnesses who remain silent at critical moments, but later offer incriminating statements in court, must be treated with extreme caution, particularly in cases based on circumstantial evidence.
The Bench remarked:
“Such belated statements, emerging for the first time during trial, must be carefully scrutinised and cannot be accepted at face value—especially when the witness was actively involved in the initial reporting of the offence.”
Here, PW-2’s silence was not passive; he was actively involved as the very person who wrote the FIR, yet chose not to disclose a crucial fact he now claims to have known from the beginning.
SC Sets Aside Conviction Due to Break in Circumstantial Chain
As PW-2’s testimony formed a key basis for the prosecution’s theory of conspiracy and motive, its rejection by the Supreme Court broke the chain of circumstantial evidence, which the prosecution had relied upon.
Coupled with absence of test identification parade, inconclusive forensic evidence, and unreliable ‘last seen’ testimony, the Court held that the conviction under Sections 302, 201 and 120-B IPC could not be sustained, and acquitted all three appellants.
“Suspicion, however strong, cannot replace legal proof,” the Court concluded.
Date of Decision: October 6, 2025
