In Zainul vs. Thee State of Bihar (2025), Supreme Court's Division Bench of Justice J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan delivered a 75-page long judgement dated October 7, 2025, wherein, it set aside the the 55-page long common judgment and order dated July 17, 2013 passed by Patna High Court's Division Bench of Justices Aditya Kumar Trivedi and Shyam Kishore Sharma in Md. Muslim & Ors. vs. The State of Bihar (2013) in Criminal Appeal (DB) No. 202 of 1990 (the impugned judgment).
The judgment authored Justice Pardiwala was delivered after hearing appeals which arose from the common judgment and order dated July 17, 2013 in Md. Muslim & Ors. vs. The State of Bihar (2013) in Criminal Appeal (DB) No. 202 of 1990 (the impugned judgment), by which the High Court had dismissed the appeal preferred by the appellants. The High Court had affirmed the judgment and order of conviction passed by the Trial Court in Sessions Case No. 124 of 1989 holding the appellants guilty of the offence of murder punishable under Section 302 read with Section 149 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. The High Court's judgment was authored by Justice Trivedi. Zainul was one of the 18 appellants before the High Court.
Supreme Court's judgment took notice of the fact that 24 accused persons were put to trial, excluding 5 persons who were declared as absconding accused. At the conclusion of the trial, 21 persons stood convicted. Whereas, 3 persons came to be acquitted. Out of the 21 convicts, 19 preferred appeals before the High Court. The High Court upheld the conviction of 12 and acquitted 7. Therefore, 12 convicts whose conviction was affirmed came before this Court in appeal. However, the appeals stood abated in so far as two appellants were concerned vide orders of the Supreme Court (Md. Muslim in Criminal Appeal No. 1187/2014 and Kaimuddin in Criminal Appeal 1329/2014). Accordingly, the two appeals before the Supreme Court concern 10 convicts.
Justice Pardiwala examined whether the prosecution could be said to have proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. He drew on Court's decision in Ramakant Rai vs. Madan Rai, reported in (2003) 12 SCC 395, wherein, the Court explained the meaning of “reasonable doubt”. It means doubts that are free from abstract speculation, not a result of anemotional response, which are actual and substantial doubts on the guilt of the accused person, and not vague apprehensions. It cannot be an imaginary, trivial or a possible doubt, but a doubt based upon reason and common sense. The relevant observations are as under:-
“23. A person has, no doubt, a profound right not to be convicted of an offence which is not established by the evidential standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt. Though this standard is a higher standard, there is, however, no absolute standard. What degree of probability amounts to “proof” is an exercise particular to each case. Referring to (sic) of probability amounts to “proof” is an exercise, the interdependence of evidence and the confirmation of one piece of evidence by another, as learned author says : [see The Mathematics of Proof II : Glanville Williams, Criminal Law Review, 1979, by Sweet and Maxwell, p. 340 (342)]
“The simple multiplication rule does not apply if the separate pieces of evidence are dependent. Two events are dependent when they tend to occur together, and the evidence of such events may also be said to be dependent. In a criminal case, different pieces of evidence directed to establishing that the defendant did the prohibited act with the specified state of mind are generally dependent. A juror may feel doubt whether to credit an alleged confession, and doubt whether to infer guilt from the fact that the defendant fled from justice. But since it is generally guilty rather than innocent people who make confessions, and guilty rather than innocent people who run away, the two doubts are not to be multiplied together. The one piece of evidence may confirm the other.”
24. Doubts would be called reasonable if they are free from a zest for abstract speculation. Law cannot afford any favourite other than the truth. To constitute reasonable doubt, it must be free from an overemotional response. Doubts must be actual and substantial doubts as to the guilt of the accused persons arising from the evidence, or from the lack of it, as opposed to mere vague apprehensions. A reasonable doubt is not an imaginary, trivial or a merely possible doubt; but a fair doubt based upon reason and common sense. It must grow out of the evidence in the case.
25. The concepts of probability, and the degrees of it, cannot obviously be expressed in terms of units to be mathematically enumerated as to how many of such units constitute proof beyond reasonable doubt.There is an unmistakable subjective element in the evaluation of the degrees of probability and the quantum of proof. Forensic probability must, in the last analysis, rest on a robust common sense and, ultimately, on the trained intuitions of the judge. While the protection given by the criminal process to the accused persons is not to be eroded, at the same time, uninformed legitimisation of trivialities would make a mockery of the administration of criminal justice. This position was illuminatingly stated by Venkatachaliah, J. (as His Lordship then was) in State of U.P. v. Krishna Gopal [(1988) 4 SCC 302: 1988 SCC (Cri) 928 : AIR 1988 SC 2154] .”
Justice Pardiwala observed: ''82. It cannot be said that the prosecution has proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. A case attains that standard when all its links are firmly established and recognizable to the eyes of a reasonable person. In the present matter, the prosecution version does not appear to stem from a truthful narration of facts. 83. The oral testimonies of the witnesses neither corroborate each other nor align with the medical records. The various contradictions in the form of material omissions go to the root of the matter, and in such circumstances, it cannot be held that the prosecution has discharged its burden of proof.''
He recollected that in State of A.P. vs. Punati Ramulu & Ors., reported in 1994 Supp (1) SCC 590, the Supreme Court observed that once it is found that the investigating officer deliberately failed to record the first information report on receipt of the information of a cognizable offence, and had prepared the FIR after deliberations, consultations and discussions, the FIR would fail to inspire confidence. The relevant observations have been reproduced below:-
“5.[…]Once we find that the investigating officer has deliberately failed to record the first information report on receipt of the information of a cognizable offence of the nature, as in this case, and had prepared the first information report after reaching the spot after due deliberations, consultations and discussion, the conclusion becomes inescapable that the investigation is tainted and it would, therefore, be unsafe to rely upon such a tainted investigation, as one would not know where the police officer would have stopped to fabricate evidence and create false clues. Though we agree that mere relationship of the witnesses PW 3 and PW 4, the children of the deceased or of PW 1 and PW 2 who are also related to the deceased, by itself is not enough to discard their testimony and that the relationship or the partisan nature of the evidence only puts the Court on its guard to scrutinise the evidence more carefully, we find that in this case when the bona fides of the investigation has been successfully assailed, it would not be safe to rely upon the testimony of these witnesses either in the absence of strong corroborative evidence of a clinching nature, which is found wanting in this case.”
In Ranbir Yadav vs. State of Bihar, reported in (1995) 4 SCC 392, the police officer had already started to investigate about a riot in the night, however, he did not record the statements of any of the persons he talked to. The FIR of the incident only came to be reported in the next morning on the basis of the information given by one of the witnesses. This Court held that the courts below erred in treating the statement as an FIR as the same was a statement under Section 161 of the CrPC. The following are the relevant excerpts:-
“38. Having gone through the evidence of PW 96 we are constrained to say that the courts below were not justified in treating Ext. 10/1 as an FIR. Undisputedly PW 96 had reached Village Laxmipur Bind Toli in the night of 11-11-1985 to investigate into the two cases registered over the incident that took place in the morning. He deposed that after reaching the village at 10.30 p.m. he got information about the second incident also and in connection therewith he had talked to several persons. He, however, stated that he did not record the statements of the persons to whom he talked to. In cross-examination it was elicited from him that on the very night he learnt that houses of some people had been looted and set on fire, some people had been murdered and that some villagers were untraceable. While being further cross-examined he volunteered that he had started the investigation of the case registered over the second incident in the same night. In the face of such admissions of PW 96 and the various steps of investigation he took in connection with the second incident there cannot be any escape from the conclusion that the report lodged by PC PW 1 on the following morning could only be treated as a statement recorded in accordance with Section 161(3) of the Code and not as an FIR. The next question, therefore is whether the evidence of PC PW 1 is inadmissible as contended by Mr Jethmalani.”
Drawing on the Court's decision Justice Pardiwala observed: ''89. There is no gainsaying that an FIR must faithfully reflect the information furnished by the informant at the very time it is presented. The true test for an information to qualify as an FIR lies in whether it is capable of supplying grounds for the police officer to suspect the commission of a cognizable offence. Once this requirement is met, the officer is bound to reduce it into writing. 90. In the present case, in the natural course of events, the PWs 3, 4, 5, and 8 respectively, would have disclosed the commission of thealleged offence to the police. The very first statement relating to the two homicidal deaths ought to have been treated as an FIR. However, the daily diary or the roznamcha entry of the police station about the visit of the witnesses to the police station or the visit of the investigating officer to the scene of occurrence or even visit of the investigating officer to the hospital was not brought on record which further creates a doubt as regards the genuineness of the FIR. In such circumstances, the statement of the PW-20 reduced as an FIR fails to inspire confidence."
Allowing the appeal, Supreme Court's Division Bench concluded that ''The impugned judgment and order to the extent of holding the appellants herein guilty of the offences they were charged with, is set aside. The appellants are accordingly acquitted. Their bail bonds stand discharged.''
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