Things said or done by conspirator in reference to common design
Where there is reasonable ground to believe that two or more persons have conspired together to commit an offence or an actionable wrong, anything said, done or written by any one of such persons in reference to their common intention, after the time when such intention was first entertained by any one of them, is a relevant fact as against each of the persons believed to be so conspiring, as well for the purpose of proving the existence of the conspiracy and for the purpose of showing that any such person was a party to it.
In Bhagwan Swarup v. State of Maharashtra, 1965, it was held that it is a settled law that the act of one accused cannot be used as evidence against the other. Section 10 is, however, an exception to this general rule. Each conspirator is regarded as being an agent of the others and as being their principal and as such is liable in the sense that each is liable for the offence of any of them. This is the same principle which is seen in Section 34 of the Indian Penal Code which says that when a criminal act is done by several persons in furtherance of a common intention of all, each such person is liable for that act in the same manner as if it were done by him alone.
This exception in the case of conspiracy is required because, as has been observed in the case of Badri Rai, 1958, a conspiracy is ‘hatched in darkness and executed in secrecy’. It is due to the nature of this crime that the acts and statements of each co-conspirator are admissible against the whole body of conspirators. However, these acts and statements must be done/made in the actual course of carrying out the conspiracy. Anything said/done later on is not relevant.
This Section is only attracted where there is reasonable ground to believe that the persons had conspired together to commit an offence or an actionable wrong i.e. to do a lawful thing by unlawful means or to do an unlawful thing. (Barindra Kumar Ghose v. Emperor, 1909)
Labels: Evidence
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