by Police - Bureau of Police Research and Development

The Indian Police Journalsometimes when omission, means what is not part of statement andwhich was not stated by witness at the time of interrogation, may alsomaking statement sensible or self-consistent, some words not stated,becomes necessary to imply. Omission in statement is implied whenpositive statement is implying those omissions. In such a situation,omission takes the shape of positive statement though it was not given“Statement in its dictionary meaning is the act of stating orreciting. Pima facie, a statement cannot take in an omission.A statement cannot include that which is not stated. But veryoften, to make a statement sensible or self-consistent, it becomesnecessary to imply words which are not actually in the statement.Though something is not expressly stated, it is necessarily impliedfrom what is directly or expressly stated. To illustrate: ‘A’ madea statement previously that he saw ’B’ stabbing ‘C’ to death; butbefore court he deposed that he saw ‘B’ and ‘D’ stabbing ‘C’to death; the court can imply the word ‘only’ after ‘B’ in thestatement before the police. Sometimes, a positive statement mayhave a negative aspect and a negative one a positive aspect. Takean extreme example: if a witness states that man is dark, it alsomeans that he is not fair. Though the statement made describesrelatively the colour of a skin, it is implicit in the statement itselfthat it is not of any other colour. Further, there are occasionswhen we come across two statements made by the same personat different times and both of them cannot stand or co-exist. Thereis an inherent repugnancy between the two; therefore, if one istrue, the other must be false. On one occasion, a person says thatwhen he entered the room he saw ‘A’ shooting ‘B’ dead with gun;on other occasion, same person says that when he entered roomhe saw ‘C’ stabbing ‘B’ dead: both statement obviously cannotand vice versa…but by construction, the said omissions must bedeemed to be part of the statement in writing. Such omissions arenot really omissions strictly so-called and the statement must bedeemed to contain them by implication. A statement, therefore,in our view not only includes what is expressly stated therin, butalso what is necessarily implied therefrom.” 11134 January - March, 2013