Relevancy of facts forming part of same transaction i.e. Res Gestae
Reference: The Indian Evidence Act
Section 6
Facts which, though not in issue, are so connected with a fact in issue as to form part of the same transaction, are relevant, whether they occurred at the same time and place or at different times and places.
Illustrations
(a) A is accused of the murder of B by beating him. Whatever was said or done by A or B or the by-standers at the beating, or so shortly or after it as to form part of the transaction, is a relevant fact.
(b) A is accused of waging war against the Government of India by taking part in an armed insurrection in which property is destroyed, troops are attacked and goals are broken open. The occurrence of these facts is relevant, as forming part of the general transaction, though A may not have been present at all of them.
(c) A sues B for a libel contained in a letter forming part of a correspondence. Letters between the parties relating to the subject out of which the libel arose, and forming part of the correspondence in which it is contained, are relevant facts, though they do not contain the libel itself.
(d) The question is, whether certain goods ordered from B were delivered to A. The goods were delivered to several intermediate persons successively. Each delivery is a relevant fact.
This Section speaks of those facts which are relevant because they form a part of the transaction. They are connected to each other in such a way that they may be referred to by a single legal name such as a crime, a contract or any other subject in inquiry which may be in evidence.
In a broad sense, a transaction is an act or a series of acts and the words which accompany those acts. The words – as can be seen from Illustration (a) – may be spoken by the person who has committed the act or by someone else: a bystander, in this Illustration, for example.
There is a great deal of case law which speaks of whether or not a fact may be considered to belong to the same transaction.
The outcry made by a witness about an offence being committed, his telling people from the vicinity about it when they reach the scene and then later going to the police station to file an FIR were held to be part of the same transaction in Shyam Nandan Singh v. State of Bihar, 1991.
The exclamations of children at the time when their mother cried out for help as her husband pushed her into a room where he killed her were received through people who had heard them and were held to be a part of the same transaction in Sawaldas v. State of Bihar, 1974.
The facts that an accused had raped a woman, strangled her to death and then pleaded for forgiveness when he was caught while trying to run away were all held to be a part of the same transaction in Vinod v. State of Uttar Pradesh, 1994.
Thus, res gestae includes acts done from the inception of the principal act which constitutes the offence till the completion of the act. They grow out of the main fact, are usually contemporaneous with it and illustrate its character. A subsequent narration of facts does not constitute res gestae.
For example, the statement of a six-year-old girl to her mother about a rape she had been subjected to was held not to constitute a fact comprehended by this Section in Indu v. State of HP, 1989.
The test of whether or not a statement may be considered to be relevant under Section 6 is spontaneity or ‘instinctiveness’ i.e. the following questions should be answered positively:
Is the even speaking for itself through the instinctive words of the participants or the witnesses?
Are the facts speaking though the words of the speaker (as opposed to the speaker narrating the events later on)?
The acts – if there is more than one involved – need not be within the space of a few minutes or (as Illustration b shows) even at the same place and at the same time. When the transaction consists of a number of acts, they must be connected by some proximity if not of time, of unity or proximity of place, or continuity of action and community of purpose or design. (Hadu v. State, 1950)
In Vinodkumar Baderbhai Patel v. State of Gujarat, 1999, it was held that the conduct of a man in arranging to burn his wife and the subsequent burning formed part of the same transaction.
Lord Wilberforce explained the principle of res gestae in Rattan v. Reginam, 1971. In this case, a man who was prosecuted for the murder of his wife claimed that the gun by which she was killed went off accidentally. However, the fact that the wife had made a telephone call just before she died asking for the police and giving her address was held to be relevant as being part of the same transaction as the victim of an accident would not have asked for the police even before the accident had occurred.
Lord Wilberforce said:
“The test should not be an uncertain one whether the making of the statement was in some sense part of the same event or transaction. This may often be difficult to establish; such external matters as the time which elapses between the event and the speaking of the words (and vice versa) and differences in location being relevant factors but not, taken by themselves, decisive criteria. As regards statements after the event, it must be for the judge to satisfy himself that the statement was so clearly made in the circumstances of spontaneity or in the involvement in the event that the possibility of concoction can be disregarded. Conversely, if he considers that the statement was made by way of narrative of a detached prior events o that the speaker was disengaged from it so as to be able to construct or adapt his account, he should disregard it.”
Section 6
Facts which, though not in issue, are so connected with a fact in issue as to form part of the same transaction, are relevant, whether they occurred at the same time and place or at different times and places.
Illustrations
(a) A is accused of the murder of B by beating him. Whatever was said or done by A or B or the by-standers at the beating, or so shortly or after it as to form part of the transaction, is a relevant fact.
(b) A is accused of waging war against the Government of India by taking part in an armed insurrection in which property is destroyed, troops are attacked and goals are broken open. The occurrence of these facts is relevant, as forming part of the general transaction, though A may not have been present at all of them.
(c) A sues B for a libel contained in a letter forming part of a correspondence. Letters between the parties relating to the subject out of which the libel arose, and forming part of the correspondence in which it is contained, are relevant facts, though they do not contain the libel itself.
(d) The question is, whether certain goods ordered from B were delivered to A. The goods were delivered to several intermediate persons successively. Each delivery is a relevant fact.
This Section speaks of those facts which are relevant because they form a part of the transaction. They are connected to each other in such a way that they may be referred to by a single legal name such as a crime, a contract or any other subject in inquiry which may be in evidence.
In a broad sense, a transaction is an act or a series of acts and the words which accompany those acts. The words – as can be seen from Illustration (a) – may be spoken by the person who has committed the act or by someone else: a bystander, in this Illustration, for example.
There is a great deal of case law which speaks of whether or not a fact may be considered to belong to the same transaction.
The outcry made by a witness about an offence being committed, his telling people from the vicinity about it when they reach the scene and then later going to the police station to file an FIR were held to be part of the same transaction in Shyam Nandan Singh v. State of Bihar, 1991.
The exclamations of children at the time when their mother cried out for help as her husband pushed her into a room where he killed her were received through people who had heard them and were held to be a part of the same transaction in Sawaldas v. State of Bihar, 1974.
The facts that an accused had raped a woman, strangled her to death and then pleaded for forgiveness when he was caught while trying to run away were all held to be a part of the same transaction in Vinod v. State of Uttar Pradesh, 1994.
Thus, res gestae includes acts done from the inception of the principal act which constitutes the offence till the completion of the act. They grow out of the main fact, are usually contemporaneous with it and illustrate its character. A subsequent narration of facts does not constitute res gestae.
For example, the statement of a six-year-old girl to her mother about a rape she had been subjected to was held not to constitute a fact comprehended by this Section in Indu v. State of HP, 1989.
The test of whether or not a statement may be considered to be relevant under Section 6 is spontaneity or ‘instinctiveness’ i.e. the following questions should be answered positively:
Is the even speaking for itself through the instinctive words of the participants or the witnesses?
Are the facts speaking though the words of the speaker (as opposed to the speaker narrating the events later on)?
The acts – if there is more than one involved – need not be within the space of a few minutes or (as Illustration b shows) even at the same place and at the same time. When the transaction consists of a number of acts, they must be connected by some proximity if not of time, of unity or proximity of place, or continuity of action and community of purpose or design. (Hadu v. State, 1950)
In Vinodkumar Baderbhai Patel v. State of Gujarat, 1999, it was held that the conduct of a man in arranging to burn his wife and the subsequent burning formed part of the same transaction.
Lord Wilberforce explained the principle of res gestae in Rattan v. Reginam, 1971. In this case, a man who was prosecuted for the murder of his wife claimed that the gun by which she was killed went off accidentally. However, the fact that the wife had made a telephone call just before she died asking for the police and giving her address was held to be relevant as being part of the same transaction as the victim of an accident would not have asked for the police even before the accident had occurred.
Lord Wilberforce said:
“The test should not be an uncertain one whether the making of the statement was in some sense part of the same event or transaction. This may often be difficult to establish; such external matters as the time which elapses between the event and the speaking of the words (and vice versa) and differences in location being relevant factors but not, taken by themselves, decisive criteria. As regards statements after the event, it must be for the judge to satisfy himself that the statement was so clearly made in the circumstances of spontaneity or in the involvement in the event that the possibility of concoction can be disregarded. Conversely, if he considers that the statement was made by way of narrative of a detached prior events o that the speaker was disengaged from it so as to be able to construct or adapt his account, he should disregard it.”
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