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Amar Singh's Right To Of Upheld By
In a significant ruling reinforcing the to a , the has held that an accused is entitled to receive a of forming part of the . Justice Anoop Kumar Dhand quashed a trial court order that had denied such access, directing that the CCTV footage stored in a DVD and pen drive be supplied to the petitioner, Amar Singh, without delay.
When a Withheld Critical Proof
Amar Singh was charge-sheeted for offences under . The entire incident was captured on CCTV, and the investigating officer submitted the footage in a DVD and pen drive along with the . However, when copies of the were furnished to the accused, these electronic records were conspicuously missing. Singh filed an application under seeking a of the , but the rejected it on the ground that no such request was made at the time of supply of the copies.
at Stake: Arguments from Both Sides
Counsel for the petitioner, led by with , , and , argued that under , the prosecution is duty-bound to supply every document it intends to rely upon. They placed reliance on the judgment in P. Gopalkrishnan vs. State of Kerala & Anr. (2020) 9 SCC 161. The Public Prosecutor, , opposed the plea, but the court found no merit in his submissions.
Legal Backbone: and
The court delved into the mandate of Section 207, which requires the Magistrate to furnish to the accused, free of cost, copies of the police report, FIR, statements, and
"any other document or relevant extract thereof forwarded to the Magistrate with the police report."
The court emphasized that the provisions are
and that the trial court's reasoning was erroneous. Precedents from
Hardeep Singh vs. State of Punjab
(2014) 3 SCC 92 and
Tarun Tyagi vs.
(2017) 4 SCC 490 were cited to underscore the obligation to ensure compliance before trial.
The court also relied on Sidhartha Vashisht @ Manu Sharma vs. State (NCT of Delhi) (2010) 6 SCC 1, which held that furnishing documents under Section 207 is a under .
Balancing and
The court acknowledged that in cases involving sensitive issues like of the complainant or victim, the court may provide only to the accused and his lawyer or expert. However, in this case, there were no such concerns pleaded, and therefore the accused was entitled to a .
Key Observations
"All documents including 'electronic record' produced for theof the Court along-with the police report and which prosecution proposes to use against the accused must be furnished to the accused as per the mandate of."
"Furnishing of documents to the accused underis a facet of right of the accused to aenshrined inof the."
"The contents of the DVD/pen drive being electronic record must be regarded as a document. If the prosecution is relying on the same, ordinarily, the accused must be given athereof to enable him/her to present anduring the trial."
Justice Restored: Court Sets Aside Erroneous Order
The High Court quashed the impugned order dated of the , and directed the trial court to supply a of the DVD and pen drive containing the CCTV footage to the accused forthwith.
The judgment was delivered in the context of a direction in Vijay Kumar and Ors. vs. State of Rajasthan , where the Apex Court had noted that many trials were stalled due to interim orders and directed High Courts to expedite such matters. This ruling reinforces the principle that procedural technicalities cannot be used to deny the accused's to a , which includes the right to inspect and use all material that the prosecution relies upon.
