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Understanding the Role of Evidence Law: Importance in Judicial Systems, Lecture notes of Law of Evidence

An overview of the concept of evidence in the context of judicial systems. It explains the role of evidence in administering justice and protecting citizens' rights, the importance of procedural law and the law of evidence, and the principles governing the collection and presentation of evidence. The document also discusses the significance of evidence law in civil and criminal proceedings.

Typology: Lecture notes

2012/2013

Uploaded on 04/25/2022

Student1010101
Student1010101 🇮🇳

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What Is Evidence?
Every case that comes before a court of law has a fact/story behind it. Facts out of
which cases arise keeps happening in the ordinary course of life. The primary
objective of any Judicial System, irrespective of any state is to administer justice and
protect the rights of the citizens. For administering justice, every judicial system has
to consider the facts of the cases and has to extract the correct facts for complete
justice; and there the importance of procedural law comes into existence. The law of
evidence act does not affect the substantive rights of parties, but only lays down the
law for facilitating the course of justice. The evidence acts laid down the rules of
evidence for the purpose of guidance of the courts it is a procedural law which
provides, inter alia, how a fact to be proved.
Ideally, when a judge receives a case, he knows nothing about the facts of the
particular case. He just knows that two parties have a dispute and have come to
settle it before him. Since he has no idea of what really happened, the onus is on
both sides to establish the facts of the case. The only way for parties to establish
what really happened is through the tendering of evidence.
Evidence can be described as the building blocks which the parties use to repaint a
picture of what happened between them. In an inquisitorial system of justice, the
judge is at liberty to come off his high horse in an attempt to understand the facts
that transpired between the parties.
The Law of Evidence is a significant part of any branch of the judicial system
irrespective of any nation, which means the role of evidence is very important statute
in every country. The lawyers have to discover what transpired and bring evidence of
what happened before the court. The judge weighs the evidence and establishes the
facts from the more established piece(s) of evidence.
The word „evidence “is derived from the Latin word evider, which means to
show clearly; to make clear to the sight ; to discover clearly; to make plainly certain
; to ascertain ;to prove. So evidence is about proving or disproving facts in issue , the
means by which such facts come to be proved or disproved.
The Scope of the Law of Evidence
The Law of Evidence is rightly categorised under adjectival law. This is due to the
fact that the law of evidence concerns itself with the procedure that parties have to
follow in order to resolve their legal issues. One of the numerous classifications of
law is the classification between substantive and adjectival/procedural law.
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What Is Evidence? Every case that comes before a court of law has a fact/story behind it. Facts out of which cases arise keeps happening in the ordinary course of life. The primary objective of any Judicial System, irrespective of any state is to administer justice and protect the rights of the citizens. For administering justice, every judicial system has to consider the facts of the cases and has to extract the correct facts for complete justice; and there the importance of procedural law comes into existence. The law of evidence act does not affect the substantive rights of parties, but only lays down the law for facilitating the course of justice. The evidence acts laid down the rules of evidence for the purpose of guidance of the courts it is a procedural law which provides, inter alia, how a fact to be proved. Ideally, when a judge receives a case, he knows nothing about the facts of the particular case. He just knows that two parties have a dispute and have come to settle it before him. Since he has no idea of what really happened, the onus is on both sides to establish the facts of the case. The only way for parties to establish what really happened is through the tendering of evidence. Evidence can be described as the building blocks which the parties use to repaint a picture of what happened between them. In an inquisitorial system of justice, the judge is at liberty to come off his high horse in an attempt to understand the facts that transpired between the parties. The Law of Evidence is a significant part of any branch of the judicial system irrespective of any nation, which means the role of evidence is very important statute in every country. The lawyers have to discover what transpired and bring evidence of what happened before the court. The judge weighs the evidence and establishes the facts from the more established piece(s) of evidence. The word „evidence “is derived from the Latin word evider, which means to show clearly; to make clear to the sight ; to discover clearly; to make plainly certain ; to ascertain ;to prove. So evidence is about proving or disproving facts in issue , the means by which such facts come to be proved or disproved. The Scope of the Law of Evidence The Law of Evidence is rightly categorised under adjectival law. This is due to the fact that the law of evidence concerns itself with the procedure that parties have to follow in order to resolve their legal issues. One of the numerous classifications of law is the classification between substantive and adjectival/procedural law.

Substantive Law includes those laws that directly provide for the rights, duties and liabilities of citizens. Examples of this include the Law of Contract, Law of Torts and Criminal Law. Adjectival/procedural laws are those that lay down the steps that parties have to follow in order to exercise the rights provided for them under the substantive law. They provide for the procedures that parties have to take in order to enforce their rights. For criminal law, the procedural law dealing with the process of enforcing it is the Administration of Criminal Justice Act. The law of evidence comes under this because it provides for the procedures that parties have to follow in order to establish facts in issue, which in turn aid in enforcing their rights, duties and obligations. The Need for Evidence Law Evidence is the only possible way by which the court can make inferences to render a decision. The definition of evidence explains that evidence is the proof of any fact in issues so without evidence there will be no possibilities to prove any fact in issues or even to establish any facts in the cases. It is very obvious that it is not much difficult task to obtain trust through violating the basic structure of law but in the course of protecting those rights Evidence, Law comes into the picture. Evidence Law tells the basic principles and rules regarding collection. So the process of evidencing any facts or proof should be governed by a well-established law in order to achieve speedy and fair justice. The law of evidence is not just a fundamental principle governing the process of proof rather it also has a multidimensional purpose of governing the rules relating to the process of proof in court proceedings. While it‟s moral dimension is a special asset in criminal trials as it endeavours in protecting the innocent and highlighting the guilty person to administer complete and fair justice. On the other hand, the evidence rules also have the capability to hide and prevent the truth to be disclosed in the public domain to protect the mass public interest. General principle of the law of evidence: The evolution of evidence law is based on certain basic principles. These are knowing as “five principles” as

  1. Best evidence must be produced in all cases: Where there is possibility of availability of best evidence the court insist on its production. The court would not consider other inferior evidence. Direct evidence is regarded as best evidence.