A PROJECT REPORT ON – “LAW RELATED TO EVIDENCE AS

APPLICATION OF LANGUAGE WHICH CAN APPLY TO ONE ONLY OF

SEVERAL PERSONS: A STUDY”
MANIPAL UNIVERSITY JAIPUR

UNDER SUPERVISION OF:- SUBMITTED BY:-

Dr. VIJAYLAXMI SHARMA MUKUL BAJAJ
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR 151301052
HEAD OF DEPARTMENT
SCHOOL OF LAW
MANIPAL UNIVERSITY JAIPUR
 CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that Mr. Mukul Bajaj student of B.A.LL.B (Hons.), Sixth Semester, School of
Law, Manipal University Jaipur has completed the project work entitled “law related to evidence
as application of language which can apply to one only of several persons: a study”, under my
supervision and guidance.
It is further certify that the candidate has made sincere efforts for the completion of the project
work.

SUPERVISOR NAME

Dr. Vijaylaxmi Sharma

Associate Professor
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I express deep sense of gratitude and indebtness to our teacher Dr. Vijaylaxmi Sharma under whose
guidance valuable suggestions, constant encouragement and kind supervision the present project
was carried out. I am also grateful to college and faculty of law for their feedback and for keeping
us on schedule.
I also wish my sincere thanks to my friends who helped directly or indirectly by giving their
valuable suggestions.

Mukul Bajaj
Contents
INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................. 5

Section 96 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 ................................................................................................ 6

CASE LAWS .................................................................................................................................................... 7

 Ponnuswami Chettiar v. P. Vellaimuthu Chettiar ................................................................................. 7

BIBLIOGRAPHY .............................................................................................................................................. 9
INTRODUCTION

Every case that comes before a court of law has a fact story behind it facts out of which cases arise
keep happening in the ordinary course of life. There is a crowded road for example people are
moving, vehicle are moving. Everyone is running at unmitigated speed suddenly two vehicles run
against each other. One of them being loaded with dynamite the accident produce an explosion
with a shocking noise as a result of which a noise in a near by hospital drops a child from
hands injuring the child cases arising out of the accident with flow into the courts. In each case the
nature and cause of the accident would be in question. The facts which led up to the climax will
have to reconstruct before the court. So that judge is able consider the real happening. Only then
he will be in position to apply the appropriate law to the fact to arrived at a just solution about the
right and liabilities of the parties. Thus, whenever a judge is called upon to pronounce upon the
right and liabilities of parties arising out of fact certain information about the facts involved in his
mind as to what the real facts are facts must be proved in the first instances and the only the matter
is rife for application of relevant laws. The practical reality is that the truth or merits of a case are
worth less unless they can be proved to be acceptance of the judge and there to enable him to act
on them. The means by which facts are proved are governed by the law of evidence. The function
of the law of evidence is lay down rules according to which the facts of case can be proved or
disproved before a court of law. The means which can be used to prove a fact are all control by the
rules and principles laid down by the law of evidence. The law of evidence does not affect
substantive right of parties but only lays down the law for facilitating the rules of evidence for the
purposes of the guidance of the court. Itis procedural law which provides inter alike how a fact is
to be proved. The evidence means any things by which any alleged matter of facts is either establish
or disproved. Any thing that makes the thing in question evidence to the court evidence. Where
the question is whether an explosion took place before a fire occurred evidence can be both oral
and documentary and electronic records can be produced as evidence. Even in criminal matter also
there can be evidence by means of electronic records including video-conferencing
Section 96 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872

Evidence as to application of language which can apply to one only of several persons:
When the facts are such that the language used might have been meant to apply to any one, and
could not have been meant to apply to more than one, of several persons or things, evidence may
be given of facts which show which of those persons or things it was intended to apply to.

Illustration:
(a) A agrees to sell to B, for Rs. 1,000, “my white horse.” A has two white horses. Evidence may
be given of facts which show which of them was meant.

(b) A agrees to accompany В to Hyderabad. Evidence may be given of facts showing whether
Hyderabad in the Dekkhan or Hyderabad in Sindh was meant.

Comments:
Section 96 deals with another type of latent ambiguity. It is a modification of the rule of Section
94. Where the language of the document is plain and is intended to apply more than one persons
or things to which the description applies, oral evidence can be given to clarify the facts which
show to which person or thing it was intended to apply. Illustrations (а) and (b) show the
meaning of it. Illustration (а) makes it clear that where A agrees to sell his white horse to В at
Rs. 1000/-. A has two white horses. Evidence can be given of facts which show which of them
was meant.

There can be no doubt that parole evidence as to the identity of a party to a deed is always
admissible, but in considering such evidence it is paramount importance to bear in mind the
indicata of identity afforded by the deed itself. When there is dispute on two dates regarding
admissibility of promissory note, evidence could be offered to show which date was meant.
CASE LAWS

 Ponnuswami Chettiar v. P. Vellaimuthu Chettiar

Mr. B. V. Viswanatha Aiyar urged vehemently before me that a promissory note in favour of a
person without his name being mentioned in it should be held to be totally invalid and inoperative
even though full consideration might have pass ed, and the person lending was known with
precision even at the time of execution by the per son borrowing, and though the description in the
context, could refer only to him.
The description of the payee in the suit promissory note was 'son of Palaniandi Chettiar' He was
certainly that. But there are also three other sons of Palaniandi Chettiar, according to the plaintiff,
though they never lent a pie to the petitioner and had not come into the picture at all. I think the
law is not so wooden as to allow this kind of quibbling by a debtor in a desperate attempt somehow
to escape his just liability.
If really the lender was not known, and if Rs. 1000 had been brought by a maid-servant or other
servant from the house of Palaniandi Chettiar and handed over to the petitioner with the statement
that a son of Palaniandi Chettiar had lent him this Rs. 1000, and the petitioner had honestly been
ignorant as to who the lender was and had executed a promissory note in favour of son of
Palaniandi, then the case might be at least arguable that Palaniandi had four sons and that the
petitioner had executed the suit note without knowing or seeing the particular son who lent him
the Rs. 1000, and so the promissory note would fail as the payee was not certain.
But here 'the son of Palaniandi' who lent the money was the plaintiff Vallaimuthu Chettiar, who
swore to it, and it was not alleged by the borrower, the defendant, that any of the other three sons
of Palaniandi had lent him a pie out of the amount in that promote. The other three sons were far
away, and had nothing to do with the petitioner or this promissory note.
Though the name of the plaintiff was not mentioned (perhaps by sheer slip or accident), the lender
and borrower knew it, and there was the description. To say that the name must always be
mentioned to make a promissory note valid is, in my opinion, not sustainable in any modern court
of justice, equity and good conscience, though such a plea might have been allowed in a court, like
the old Anglo-saxon Courts, deciding on outworn formulae without reference to living facts.
Many a Hindu woman will not name her husband, but to say from that that she has no. husband
will be absurd. Many a man is known by his caste or village or official name, or surname, like
Mudaliar. Ayyar or Rao, Ambedkar, Gandhi, Nehru, Kirloskar, Prime Minister, Rajah of Sandur,
etc., and not by his personal name.
To say that hundreds of Raos, Mudaliars Ayyars, Gandhis, Nehrus etc., might have been the
persons who lent the money, when the particular man who has lent the money is known, even at
that time Beyond all doubt, to the lender and the borrower is, in my opinion, disingenuous and
meaningless, The Hindu law givers and Mimamsakas have said, 2000 years ago, that 'I' cannotbe
made into 'O' or 'O' into 'I', by anyamount of quibbling, and that arguments will notavail to show
that there is no gooseberry on thepalm when it is there. . . .,
So too, no amount of quibbling can change the fact that this particular promissory note was
executed by the petitioner in favour of the plaintiff, that particular son of Palaniandi. This defence
had been raised only because the defence of 'no consideration' collapsed. The plaintiff swore that
he was the man who lent, and the defendant would not swear that the plaintiff was not the man
who was mentioned in the promissory note as the lender.
The description in the promissory note is, no doubt, a little defective because of the failure to
mention the rank of the plaintiff among palaniandi's sons like 'first son of Palaniandi' etc. But
the evidence (which can be let in in such cases to clear the prefended, but not real, ambiguity)
shows that the parties knew even then with certainty that the lender was the plaintiff, and no other
son of Palaniandi. Section 96 of the Indian Evidence Act willapply, as held by the learned Judges
at the newtrial and evidence regarding the name could belet in in such cases. The ruling in Abdul
HakimEar Mahomed v. Ebrahim Solaiman Salehjee andCo., 33 CLJ 132: AIR 1921 Cal 480 (A),
showsthis. In this view, the civil revision petition has nomerits, and is dismissed, but in the
circumstances,without costs
BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. EVIDENCE LAW, Dr, S.R. Myeni, Sixteenth Edition, central law agency, 2015
2. LAW OF EVIDENCE, Rattanlal Dhirajlal, twenty-first Edition, Lexis Nexis, 2016