A is prosecuted for murder of B on 1.1.84. Are the following facts relevant and why: (i) That A being the son of B, needed his inheritance at once. (ii) That A was 300 kilometres away from the scene of occurrence on the date and at the time of alleged incident. (iii) A, when told that police was looking for the murderer of 'B', started running away.

The three facts in this problem are beautifully designed into three distinct but interconnected provisions — Section 8 (motive), Section 11 (alibi), and Section 8 again (conduct revealing guilty mind) of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, corresponding to Sections 6, 9, and 6 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023.

I. A, Being the Son of B, Needed His Inheritance at Once

This fact is relevant as evidence of motive under Section 8 of the IEA (now Section 6(1) of the BSA), which declares that "any fact is relevant which shows or constitutes a motive or preparation for any fact in issue or relevant fact." Here, the fact in issue is whether A murdered B on 1st January 1984. If A stood to inherit B's estate and urgently required money, that financial desperation constitutes the moving impulse — the motive — which may have propelled him to commit the act charged.

Motive, it must be understood, is not the same as intention in the narrow legal sense. As the Supreme Court explained in Natha Singh v. Emperor (AIR 1946 PC 187), motive is the emotion or impulse that incites the act. In that case, the accused's motive to silence a blackmailer who knew of his earlier murder was held to be a highly relevant circumstance. Similarly, in our problem, the son's urgent need to access his inheritance makes it plausible — though certainly not conclusive — that he had a reason to hasten B's death. Courts have consistently held that where a case rests on circumstantial evidence, as murder cases very often do, motive assumes considerable importance as one link in the chain.

That said, one must be careful not to overstate the weight of motive alone. The Supreme Court in State of Punjab v. Sucha Singh (AIR 2003 SC 1471) firmly laid down that "motive, however strong, cannot take the place of proof." Its absence does not absolve the accused, and its presence does not convict him. Motive is an attendant circumstance that intensifies or diminishes the probability of the charge — it is not itself the charge. So, the fact of A needing his inheritance urgently is clearly relevant; its weight in the final adjudication is an entirely different matter.

II. A Was 300 Kilometres Away on the Date and Time of the Incident

This fact is relevant under Section 11 of the IEA (now Section 9 of the BSA), which provides that facts not otherwise relevant become relevant "if they are inconsistent with any fact in issue or relevant fact, or if by themselves or in connection with other facts they make the existence or non-existence of any fact in issue or relevant fact highly probable or improbable."

This is the classic plea of alibi — the Latin term meaning "elsewhere." The assertion that A was 300 kilometres away from the scene of the murder at the very time it occurred is fundamentally inconsistent with the fact in issue that A committed the murder. The Act itself provides the illustration: "The question is, whether A committed a crime at Calcutta on a certain day. The fact that, on that day, A was at Lahore is relevant." The present problem mirrors this illustration almost exactly — the geographical distance makes A's physical participation in the murder highly improbable, if not impossible.

The nature of alibi evidence, however, carries a special burden. The Supreme Court in Dudh Nath Pandey v. State of U.P. (AIR 1981 SC 911) cautioned that alibi, being a special defence, must be established with certainty. The court observed that the burden on the accused to prove alibi is not as heavy as the prosecution's burden of proving guilt beyond reasonable doubt, yet the alibi must be proved to the satisfaction of the court — it cannot rest on a mere assertion. The accused must show, through credible evidence, that he was indeed at the claimed location at the material time. Once a plausible alibi is proved, the burden shifts back to the prosecution to disprove it. Section 103 of the IEA (now Section 106 of the BSA) provides that the burden of proving any particular fact lies on the person who desires the court to believe its existence. Thus, A who pleads the alibi bears the burden of first establishing it.

III. A Started Running Away When Told the Police Were Looking for B's Murderer

This fact is relevant as subsequent conduct of the accused under Section 8 of the IEA (now Section 6(2) of the BSA). The section declares that the conduct of any party in reference to any fact in issue or relevant fact is relevant "if such conduct influences or is influenced by any fact in issue or relevant fact, and whether it was previous or subsequent thereto." Explanation 2 to Section 8 further provides that "when the conduct of any person is relevant, any statement made to him or in his presence and hearing, which affects such conduct, is relevant."

The situation in our problem is practically identical to Illustration (f) to Section 8 of the IEA (and Illustration (f) to Section 6 of the BSA), which runs: "The question is, whether A robbed B. The facts that, after B was robbed, C said in A's presence — 'the police are coming to look for the man who robbed B', and that immediately afterwards A ran away, are relevant." In our problem, A is told that the police are looking for B's murderer, and he immediately starts running — the conduct is precisely analogous. The statement made in A's hearing is relevant because it affects and explains A's subsequent conduct, and the conduct itself — the flight — is relevant as a circumstance indicating a consciousness of guilt.

The Supreme Court in Thimma v. State of Mysore (AIR 1971 SC 1871) observed that the conduct of an accused in absconding when the police get suspicious of his complicity "is relevant under this section and might well be indicative to some extent of guilty mind." However, the Court added an important qualification: this is not the only conclusion to which the flight must lead. As the court pointed out, the instinct of self-preservation is powerful, and "even innocent persons may, when suspected of grave crimes, be tempted to evade arrest." Similarly, in Kartarey v. State of U.P. (AIR 1976 SC 76), the court held that to be an absconder in the eye of law, it is not necessary that a person should have run away from home — it is sufficient if he hides himself to evade the process of law.

The flight, therefore, is a relevant inculpatory circumstance, but the court must weigh it alongside all other evidence. Flight alone cannot sustain a conviction. As Wigmore observed — a statement the Indian Supreme Court has adopted approvingly — "flight from justice, and its analogous conduct, have always been deemed indicative of consciousness of guilt," but it is a piece of circumstantial evidence that must be evaluated in the totality of the prosecution case.

A Summary View

All three facts, taken together, form a constellation of circumstantial evidence. No single one of them is conclusive. The first shows why A may have wanted to kill B; the third shows how A behaved after the killing; and the second, if successfully proved, could destroy the prosecution's case entirely by placing A elsewhere. Courts in India have consistently held that in circumstantial evidence cases, the entire chain of circumstances must be complete, consistent with guilt, and inconsistent with innocence before a conviction can be recorded — as the Supreme Court reiterated in Hanumant v. State of Madhya Pradesh (AIR 1952 SC 343), a judgment that has guided Indian criminal courts for over seven decades.