If Superior Courts will say that “All judgements in Criminal Cases are in facts of those cases and are not precedents for other cases where facts are dissimilar”……then there will be chaos and uncertainty in all criminal and civil cases unless such words are understood in proper context.

When a lawyer will cite precedents in trial court, the judge can disregard all those citations by writing one line that “facts on those cases are different”.

Thus all precedents will lose their persuasive value.

Arbitrariness in discretionary orders may follow.

Stability in law will become subjective and outcome of case will be different as per subjective views of each different Judge.

The truth is, all judgements are given in the context of certain facts of each case.

But underlying principles of law and of evaluation of Evidence remains the same. They must be applied in such a way that selective reliance on precedents is avoided.

Even when facts are different, the law and observations and principles discussed by superior courts are still supposed to have some binding value on lower courts to prevent uncertainty in Criminal Law.

Perhaps some balance can be found between Cetainity of Law and Certainty of Justice.

Haresh Raichura 31/7/17 revised 31/7/20

#law #India