Legal provisions regarding reports of certain Government scientific experts under section 293 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
According to Section 293 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, any document purporting to be a report under the hand of a Government scientific expert, namely;
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(a) Any Chemical Examiner or Assistant Chemical Examiner to Government;
(b) The Chief Inspector of Explosives;
(c) The Director of the Finger Print Bureau;
(d) The Director Haffkeine Institute, Bombay;
(e) The Director, Deputy Director or Assistant Director of a Central Forensic Science Laboratory or a State Forensic Science Laboratory;
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(f) The serologist to the Government;
To whom Section 293 of the Code applies, upon any matter or thing duly submitted to him for examination or analysis and report in the course of any proceeding under the Code of Criminal Procedure, and may be used as evidence in any inquiry, trial or other proceeding under the Code of Criminal Procedure. The Court, if it thinks fit, summons and examines any such expert as to the subject-matter of his report.
Where any such expert is summoned by a Court, and he is unable to attend personally, he may, unless the Court has expressly directed him to appear personally, depute any responsible officer working with him to attend the Court, if such officer is conversant with the facts of the case and can satisfactorily depose in Court on his behalf.
The use of the word ‘document’ in Section 293 can lead to an inference that not only the opinion of the chemical examiner but all that is stated in the report becomes admissible without formal proof. Though the report as such is admissible in evidence, its probative value depends upon several circumstances, such as the data available, the method of analysis, the fullness of the conclusion, and speaking generally, the vulnerability to which the expert’s premise is subject.