Retracted confession can still sustain liability if voluntary and corroborated by independent evidence.

A belated retraction of a confessional statement does not automatically destroy its evidentiary value under FERA. Where the retraction is made after a long delay and no specific facts are shown to support allegations of coercion, pressure, or torture, the statement may still be treated as voluntary. If independent corroborative material supports the admission, it can be relied on to establish contravention and sustain penalty. The operative test is whether the confession was voluntary, true, and sufficiently corroborated; a late and unsupported retraction alone is not enough to render it unusable.

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Issues: Whether the appellant's belated retraction of his confessional statement displaced its evidentiary value and prevented reliance on that statement, read with corroborative material, for sustaining the finding of contravention under FERA and the penalty imposed.

Analysis: The retraction was made after more than ten years and only at the stage of personal hearing. No prompt or specific allegation of threat, coercion, pressure, or torture was shown, and no particulars were furnished as to who applied such pressure or how it operated. The statement was also supported by independent corroborative material, including the faxed list of persons to whom payments were to be distributed. In law, a retracted confession is not excluded merely because it is retracted; what matters is whether it was voluntary, true, and sufficiently corroborated by independent evidence.

Conclusion: The retracted confessional statement was rightly relied upon, the contraventions were proved, and the penalty was sustained in favour of the Revenue.

Final Conclusion: The appeal failed because the challenged admission remained credible and corroborated, and the adjudication sustaining the FERA contraventions and penalty was upheld.

Ratio Decidendi: A retracted confession may form the basis of liability if it is found voluntary, is not shown to have been obtained by coercion or duress, and receives independent corroboration; a highly belated and unsupported retraction does not by itself render the statement unusable.

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