Indian Evidence Act

A judgment of criminal court is relevant as per Sections 40 to 43 of the Indian Evidence Act in civil proceedings. There is no embargo on the civil court to place reliance upon it as a corroborative material, observed the Supreme Court in Satish Chander Ahuja v. Sneha Ahuja [(2020) 11 SCC 415].

Once a compact disk containing video recording is produced in accordance with the requirement of Section 65B of the Indian Evidence Act it becomes an admissible piece of evidence just like any document, the Supreme Court observed in Kailas s/o Bajirao Pawar v. State of Maharashtra [2025 INSC 1117].

The Supreme Court (SC), in The State of Madhya Pradesh v Balveer Singh [2025 INSC 261], says that the testimony of a seven-year-old child witness cannot be dismissed outright because, under Section 118 of the Evidence Act, and a child is competent to testify if they can understand the questions and provide rational answers.

Comparing signatures based on photocopy, in the absence of an original document, is a “slippery slope” and should be done with great care and circumspection, says the Kerala High Court in M G Sreejith v M/s MSS Hospital & Nursing College Pvt Ltd & Another [2025:KER:5968].

A dying declaration is a written or verbal statement made by a person, when he is facing imminent death.  The declaration must be as to the cause of the declarant’s death or as to any of the circumstances of the transaction which resulted in his death.

A former statement given by a witness before any authority legally competent to investigate the case at or about the time when the fact took place, needs to be proved to corroborate any later testimony (relating to the same fact or event) given by the witness in the court. Then the former statement is admitted as corroborative evidence when it is consistent with the later testimony, under Section 157 of the Indian Evidence Act.

The Section 65 (f) of the IEA allows certified copies permitted under the IEA or by any other law in force in India to be treated as secondary evidence. The RTI Act falls within the ambit of "any other law in force in India.” Therefore the certified copies obtained through the RTI Act can be treated as secondary evidence and can be admitted in court and they can be presumed to be true, unlike a private document.

The signature and handwriting of a person can be proved in the court by different ways depending on the facts of each case, as per the provisions of the Indian Evidence Act, 1882 (IEA)