The main legal point established in the judgment is the requirement for proper identification of the voice in electronic recordings, the accuracy of the record, and the relevance of the recorded subject matter according to the rules of relevancy under the Evidence Act.

V. Ramkumar, J.

1. The first of the revisions is filed by the State and the other revision is filed by the de facto complainant. In both the revisions the order challenged is the very same order dated 27/06/2008 passed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Thiruvananthapuram, in CMP No. 2264 of 2008 in CC 523 of 2008.

2. Sr. Advocate Sri. P. G. Thambi, the learned Director General of Prosecutions who is also the Public Prosecutor, High Court of Kerala, made the following submissions before me:

The video capsules, the compact discs and the audio cassettes will have to be read in evidence by playing the same in Court or by getting the contents of the cassettes transcribed into writings for a better appreciation and evaluation of those electronic documents. The whole process, if permitted will take only two hours and the Chief Judicial Magistrate was wrong in not allowing the request made by the Special Public Prosecutor in the above case. It was on the request made by Sri. Jacob Punnoos, the Addl. Director General of Police that the State has filed this Revision.

3. Advocate Sri. Shaji Thomas, the learned counsel appearing for the de facto complainant / petitioner in Crl. RP No. 2308 of 2008 made the following submissions before me:

This is a case in which the occurrence took place in the year 1993 and the de facto complainant is even now struggling for justice. This case had a chequered career. The main offenders in this case are high ranking police officers and the initial investigation was one sided and tardy and the de facto complainant (Sabu George) had to approach this Court for changing the investigating agency. A Division Bench of this Court had monitored the investigation after entrusting the same with the present investigating officer namely Sri. Jacob Punnoos who had filed 7 interim reports before the Division Bench. The de facto complainant was abducted and brutally manhandled and a false case was fabricated against him consequent on the criminal conspiracy hatched by Sri. Joseph Thomas, IPS the then Additional Director General of Police (A1) and others. During the course of investigation, the de facto complainant had brought to the notice of the Division Bench of this Court about the recording of video and audio cassettes on 06/01/1998 in the house of PW 2 (Joseph Kuruvinakunnel) where the first accused had visited in the presence of some of the prosecution witnesses including the de facto complainant. During the course of the conversation A1 had confessed his complicity in the occurrence. It was on the directions of the Division Bench of this Court that the investigating officer took custody of the video and audio cassettes from PW 2. Subsequently, as permitted by the Division Bench the investigating officer had transcribed the contents of the video and audio cassettes into compact discs at Riyan Digital Studio Ernakulam. It was for a better appreciation of those compact discs which are primary evidence that the Special Public Prosecutor filed CMP No. 2264 of 2008. S.65(B) of the Evidence Act has no application to the said compact discs. The compact discs which are before Court are "documents" within the meaning of S.3 of the Evidence Act. In Yusuf Ali v. State of Maharashtra, 1968 Mah LJ 179 : AIR 1968 SC 147, Rama Reddy v. V. V. Giri, 1970 KHC 77 : 1970 KLT 390 : 1970 (2) SCC 340 : AIR 1971 SC 1162, R. M. Malkhani v. State of Maharashtra, 1973 (1) SCC 471 : 1973 SCC (Cri) 399 : 1973 (2) SCR 417 : 1973 Cri. LJ 228 : 1973 Mah LJ 92 : 1973 MPLJ 224 : 1973 (2) SCWR 776 : AIR 1973 SC 1571 and Z. B. Bhukhari v. B. R. Mehra, 1976 (2) SCC 17 : 1975 Supp SCR 281 : AIR 1975 SC 1788 the Apex Court has held that tape recorder conversation is an admissible piece of evidence provided the voice of the person alleged to be speaking must be duly identified by the maker of the record or by others who know the same and the accuracy of what has been recorded is proved by the maker of the record so as to rule out possibilities of tamperi