The Conundrum Of Hostile Witnesses: Challenges & Reasons
- IJLLR Journal
- May 13
- 1 min read
Aakriti Srivastava, Dr. Ram Manohar Lohiya National Law University
INTRODUCTION
A famous quote by legal thinker Jeremy Bentham states, “witnesses are the eyes and ears of justice.” The whole adversarial system rests on the principle that the judge is the neutral umpire and the two parties will adduce evidence to prove their case and point out faults in each other's stories. It is against this very congenial assumption that the conundrum of a hostile witness rears its head.
Hostile witness summons the inquisitorial judge from inside the neutral umpire, who now has to actively analyse whether the witness can be trusted and to what extent in favour of the ends of justice. A hostile witness many times topples the whole case. It would be a utopian dream to think that the increasing phenomenon of hostile witnesses doesn’t harm the truth, justice and society. As once noted by the Supreme Court, “Wrong convictions and wrong acquittals both damage society.”1 In this paper, we will analyse the challenges posed by hostile witnesses and probe the reasons behind the phenomenon.
HOSTILE WITNESS & CHALLENGES
As inferred from the quote by Bentham, a court cannot be present everywhere. Thus, the role of witnesses becomes of crucial importance. A witness is generally any person who has witnessed, i.e., knows about or has seen or heard, any information which is relevant for the purpose of the case to reach the end of justice.
They are an important part of the criminal justice system and provide crucial assistance to the court to discover the truth. Their testimony is recognised under Section 2(e) of the Bhartiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023, as oral evidence.
