Revisional interference with acquittal and section 27 recovery evidence: exceptional revision only, with discovery-linked statements admissible.

Revisional interference with an acquittal at the instance of a private complainant is confined to exceptional cases such as manifest illegality, glaring procedural defect, gross miscarriage of justice, or wrongful exclusion of admissible evidence; it cannot be used indirectly to bypass the bar on converting an acquittal into a conviction by ordering a retrial on a mere reappreciation of evidence. Under section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act, so much of an accused's information in police custody as distinctly relates to the discovery is admissible, and where the statement is integral to the recovery, the whole discovery-linked statement may be admissible. The commentary states that wrongly excluded admissible recovery evidence justified setting aside the acquittal and remitting the matter for rehearing.

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Issues: (i) whether the High Court could interfere in revision with an order of acquittal at the instance of a private complainant and direct a retrial; (ii) whether the accused's statement leading to recovery of stolen ornaments was admissible in evidence under section 27.

Issue (i): whether the High Court could interfere in revision with an order of acquittal at the instance of a private complainant and direct a retrial

Analysis: Revisional interference with an acquittal at the instance of a private party is confined to exceptional cases, such as manifest illegality, glaring procedural defect, or gross miscarriage of justice. The power under section 439(4) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 forbids converting an acquittal into a conviction, and that limitation cannot be circumvented indirectly by an order of retrial based merely on reappreciation of evidence. Interference is justified where material admissible evidence has been wrongly excluded or other comparable exceptional circumstances exist.

Conclusion: The High Court could interfere only if the case fell within those exceptional limits; a retrial cannot be ordered merely as a device to avoid the bar against converting acquittal into conviction.

Issue (ii): whether the accused's statement leading to recovery of stolen ornaments was admissible in evidence under section 27

Analysis: Section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 makes admissible so much of the information given by an accused in police custody as distinctly relates to the fact discovered. The admissible part is not confined to a bare pointer to the place of recovery if the entire statement is integral to the discovery. A statement that the accused would show the place where the ornaments were hidden directly related to the discovery and was therefore admissible in full, and the same principle applied to the co-accused's statement leading to recovery from Bada Sab.

Conclusion: The statement leading to discovery was wholly admissible under section 27, and the Sessions Judge wrongly excluded part of it.

Final Conclusion: The acquittal was liable to be set aside because admissible evidence had been wrongly excluded, and the proper course was to remit the appeals for rehearing rather than sustain a final acquittal.

Ratio Decidendi: In revision against an acquittal, the High Court may interfere only in exceptional cases, including where material admissible evidence has been wrongly excluded, and under section 27 the whole of the information that distinctly relates to the discovery is admissible if it is integral to that discovery.

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