Alibi - Definition - Law Dictionary Home Dictionary Definition alibi

Definition :

Alibi (elsewhere). It is a defence restored to where the party accused, in order to prove that he could not have committed the crime with which he is charged, offers evidence that he was in a different place at the time the offence was committed.

Else ware, in law this term is used to express that defence in a criminal prosecution, where the party-accused, in order to prove that he could not have committed the crime charged against him, offers evidence that he was in a different place at that time. The plea taken should be capable of meaning that having regard to the time and place when and where he is alleged to have committed the offence, he could not have been present. The plea of alibi postulates the physical impossibility of the presence of the accused to the scene of offence by reason of his presence at another place. Denial by an accused of an assertion made by his employer that the accused was on leave of absence from duty on the date of offence does not, by any stretch of reasoning or logic, amount to pleading alibi, Subhash Chand v. State of Rajasthan, (2002) 1 SCC 702 (712).

It is a convenient term used for the defence taken by an accused that when the occurrence took place he was so far away from the place of occurrence that it is highly improbable that he would have participated in the crime. Alibi is not an exception (special or general envisaged in the Indian Penal Code or any other law. It is only a rule of evidence recognized in s. 11 of the Evidence Act that facts which are inconsistent with the fact in issue are relevant, see also Munshi Prasad v. State of Bihar, (2002) 1 SCC 351: AIR 2001 SC 3031. See also Janantibhai Bhenkarbhai v. State of Gujarat, (2002) 8 SC 165 (175).