Conduct under section 8 of Evidence Act 1950

Conduct under section 8 encompasses both prior and subsequent conduct. It was quite firmly held in Ibrahim bin Mohd v. PP that it must not be referred to in isolation, but be considered with other evidence or circumstances. Illustrations (f), (g), (h) and (i) of the Section provides good examples of conduct as admissible evidence.

A very useful case to exemplify this section would be Chandrasekaran v. PP. Here the appellant was convicted under the Prevention of Corruption Act 1961, for conspiracy to defraud the government. The appellant had volunteered a statement to a colleague that he had won about $5,000 at races. He also said that he bought $1,000 diamond ring for his wife a few days ago from his alleged turf club winnings. Justice Raja Azlan Shah held that there was no cause to make those statements, except for obvious reasons. Such conduct was held to be relevant and admissible as there was no other reasonable explanation to them but the showing of guilt on the appellant.

Now, it is well established that statements per se are not conduct, as stated in explanation 1 of the Section. A police report, or a complaint can be a conduct as it was accompanied by acts. This was established in Boota Singh v. PP and Aziz bin Muhammad Din v. PP. However, in PP v. Azilah bin Hadri, the conduct of the accused of pointing to a spot in the crime scene and saying ‘itulah tempat perempuan itu diletupkan’ was held to be inadmissible. It was differentiated from Bala Matik v. PP, where in that case, the act of pointing at a parang alone was admissible as there was no words.

If we read the explanation to Section 8 carefully, if a statement is accompanied by acts, it is admissible. In PP v. Azilah bin Hadri, the statement was accompanied by the act of pointing a finger, yet it was inadmissible. I humbly disagree with court on that point. Hope to hear your opinions on this case.

Written By 

Surendra