Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023
Section 141
Judge to decide as to admissibility of evidence
(1) When either party proposes to give evidence of any fact, the Judge may ask the party proposing to give the evidence in what manner the alleged fact, if proved, would be relevant; and the Judge shall admit the evidence if he thinks that the fact, if proved, would be relevant, and not otherwise.
(2) If the fact proposed to be proved is one of which evidence is admissible only upon proof of some other fact, such last mentioned fact must be proved before evidence is given of the fact first mentioned, unless the party undertakes to give proof of such fact, and the Court is satisfied with such undertaking.
(3) If the relevancy of one alleged fact depends upon another alleged fact being first proved, the Judge may, in his discretion, either permit evidence of the first fact to be given before the second fact is proved, or require evidence to be given of the second fact before evidence is given of the first fact. Illustrations.
(a) It is proposed to prove a statement about a relevant fact by a person alleged to be dead, which statement is relevant under section 26. The fact that the person is dead must be proved by the person proposing to prove the statement, before evidence is given of the statement.
(b) It is proposed to prove, by a copy, the contents of a document said to be lost. The fact that the original is lost must be proved by the person proposing to produce the copy, before the copy is produced.
(c) A is accused of receiving stolen property knowing it to have been stolen. It is proposed to prove that he denied the possession of the property. The relevancy of the denial depends on the identity of the
property. The Court may, in its discretion, either require the property to be identified before the denial of the possession is proved, or permit the denial of the possession to be proved before the property is identified.
(d) It is proposed to prove a fact A which is said to have been the cause or effect of a fact in issue. There are several intermediate facts B, C and D which must be shown to exist before the fact A can be regarded as the cause or effect of the fact in issue. The Court may either permit A to be proved before B, C or D is proved, or may require proof of B, C and D before permitting proof of A.
Why this exists
This provision (derived from Section 136 of the old Indian Evidence Act, 1872, drafted by Sir James Fitzjames Stephen) exists to keep trials focused and orderly. Without such a rule, parties could flood the court with facts that seem important but have no real bearing on the case, wasting time and confusing the fact-finder. The provision gives judges an active gatekeeping role — to test relevance before admitting evidence — and lets them manage the logical sequence when one fact's relevance is chained to another.
How courts read it
Courts under the identical predecessor Section 136 of the Evidence Act, 1872, held that this section gives the judge a supervisory, almost inquisitorial power to test relevance before letting evidence in, rather than leaving admissibility purely to the parties. Judges have used their discretion under sub-section (3) flexibly — sometimes allowing 'conditional relevance' evidence to come in provisionally, subject to later proof of the connecting fact, to avoid disrupting the natural flow of a trial.
Common misconceptions
- Myth: Any evidence a lawyer wants to present must automatically be allowed in court.
Fact: The judge has the power to first ask how the evidence is relevant, and can refuse to admit it if it doesn't logically connect to the case. - Myth: Facts must always be proved in the exact order they occurred.
Fact: The judge has discretion to allow flexible ordering — sometimes permitting a fact to be proved first even if it logically depends on another, as long as the connection is eventually established.