Disputed WhatsApp Message Cannot Sustain Conviction, the Supreme Court has held, acquitting a Chhattisgarh man of murder in a case resting wholly on circumstantial evidence.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court has set aside the murder conviction of a Chhattisgarh man, holding that a WhatsApp message whose author and basis were never established by evidence could create at best a suspicion, and that suspicion cannot sustain a conviction in a case built on circumstantial evidence [Kusumlal Sao v. State of Chhattisgarh].
A Bench of Justice Manoj Misra and Justice Vijay Bishnoi allowed the appeal, set aside the judgments of the Chhattisgarh High Court at Bilaspur and the Trial Court, and acquitted the appellant of all charges, directing his release unless wanted in any other case.
How the case reached the Court
On 9 February 2019 a man was found dead in an open field with a motorcycle and a rope beside him. The incident was first reported as an accidental death. After inquest and autopsy it was suspected to be a homicide and an FIR was registered against unknown persons. The prosecution alleged that the appellant killed the man in a fight at his house on the night of 7 February 2019 and dumped the body in the field.
It relied on a WhatsApp message sent from one witness’s phone to another’s in the early hours of 8 February 2019, the appellant’s disclosure statement and the recovery of an iron rod and screwdriver, and blood-stained soil and a shirt, and injuries found on the appellant during examination on 11 February 2019.
The Trial Court convicted the appellant under Sections 302 and 201 of the Indian Penal Code in S.T. No. 08 of 2019 on 30 March 2024 and the Chhattisgarh High Court dismissed his appeal (Criminal Appeal No. 1482 of 2024). The High Court had found, among other circumstances, that the deceased was last seen with the appellant and that a quarrel took place shortly before the incident. The Supreme Court noted that the prosecution examined 26 witnesses and that the witnesses meant to show the deceased at the appellant’s house had turned hostile or denied knowledge.
The legal position
The Bench began with the settled test for circumstantial evidence from Sharad Birdhichand Sarda v. State of Maharashtra: the circumstances must be fully established, point unerringly to guilt, form a complete chain and exclude every hypothesis other than the guilt of the accused. It added that the accused ‘must be’ and not merely ‘may be’ guilty before a court convicts.
What the Court said on the WhatsApp message
The prosecution said the messages were relevant under Sections 6, 7 and 8 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872. The Bench held that Section 6 requires proof that the texting formed part of the same transaction as the crime, but the time of death had not been fixed by any substantive evidence. Section 8, it said, concerns the conduct of the parties, the accused or the victim and did not apply.
Even assuming Section 7, the message showed only that a message had gone from one phone to another. The sender denied sending it and the recipient denied knowing of the incident, so who authored it and whether it rested on personal knowledge or hearsay remained unanswered:
“Thus, the exchange of message between PW-5 and PW-6 does not prove that on the fateful night the deceased was present in the house of the accused and that the accused had assaulted the deceased, it, at best, creates a suspicion against the accused-appellant which by itself is not sufficient to sustain conviction.”
Blood-stained recoveries and the accident theory
On the recoveries, the Court noted that the blood stains could not be connected to the deceased and no DNA profile had been matched. One seizure witness said that blood-stained soil was collected only from the place where the body lay, not from the appellant’s house, and the two seizure witnesses differed on where items were recovered. The autopsy surgeon had not ruled out that the injuries could have been caused by a fall from a motorcycle, and the deceased was a person habituated to substance abuse, which the Court said made the accident theory probable and created a doubt about the prosecution case.
It held that the lack of explanation for the appellant’s injuries could not by itself lead to an inference of guilt, since none of the witnesses deposed that the two men were seen fighting that night.
Why the judgment matters
The decision is a reminder that a digital message tendered through a forensic extraction and a certificate under Section 65-B still has to be linked to a competent witness before it can prove the facts it narrates. Producing the electronic record settles its authenticity, not the truth or source of its contents.
It also reaffirms that, where the chain of circumstances is broken and a plausible alternative such as an accident exists, the benefit of doubt goes to the accused. The Court’s concluding finding was that there was ‘hardly any evidence’ on which the conviction could be sustained.
Case Title: Kusumlal Sao v. State of Chhattisgarh [Criminal Appeal No. 4894 of 2026, arising out of SLP (Crl.) No. 11542 of 2026]
Bench: Justice Manoj Misra and Justice Vijay Bishnoi, Supreme Court of India
Date of Judgment: October 13, 2026
Appearances: Yasharth Kant, for the appellant; Ankita Sharma, for the State of Chhattisgarh