Mehatar v. The State of Maharashtra
Background
Following a land and property dispute between neighbouring families in a Maharashtra village, a mob attack in December 2005 led to the deaths of two men. The trial court convicted ten accused based substantially on the testimony of the complainant, Sindhubai, who was the wife of one deceased and sister-in-law of the other. On appeal, the Bombay High Court acquitted six of the ten accused after finding parts of Sindhubai's testimony unreliable, but upheld the conviction of three, including the appellants Mehatar and Rajkumar (a third co-accused, Baburao, died during the Supreme Court appeal and his case was separately closed).
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court held that once a court finds a witness's testimony to be "partly reliable and partly unreliable" (as opposed to wholly reliable or wholly unreliable), conviction cannot rest on that testimony alone without independent corroboration, applying the settled principle from Vedivelu Thevar v. State of Madras. Since the High Court itself had disbelieved parts of Sindhubai's account when acquitting other accused, and no other witness (Sitabai, Tekaram, the Sarpanch) was examined to corroborate her version, while the one witness who was examined (the Police Patil) turned hostile, the Court found there was no corroboration at all for the remaining conviction. It therefore set aside the conviction of Mehatar and Rajkumar, acquitted them of all charges, and ordered Mehatar's bail bonds discharged and Rajkumar released forthwith unless wanted in another case.
Lesson Learnt
When a court finds a witness only partly believable, that witness's word alone cannot sustain a conviction - the law requires independent corroboration before guilt can be considered proved beyond reasonable doubt.