Your WhatsApp screenshot in court? Not without this one paper.

You think a screenshot is enough proof in court? The Supreme Court just said — not without a certificate.

An election petition. A handful of CDs — scratched, labelled with a felt-tip pen — containing video recordings of voters. And a question that would travel all the way to the Supreme Court: can a judge even look at that footage if the person who created the CD hasn't signed a single piece of paper?

The answer, delivered on September 18, 2014, in Anvar P.V. v. P.K. Basheer and Others, changed how electronic evidence works in every Indian courtroom — from a WhatsApp screenshot in a divorce case to a CCTV clip in a murder trial.

When the video arrived in court

The facts began in a Kerala election dispute. The petitioner, Anvar P.V., had lost. He alleged that the election of P.K. Basheer was vitiated by corrupt practices. To prove his case, he wanted to produce video recordings stored on CDs — footage that, he claimed, showed the winning candidate's agents distributing money to voters.

The CDs were computer output. They were not the original camera, not the original memory card. They were copies. And the person who had transferred the footage onto those CDs had not filed the certificate required under Section 65B of the Indian Evidence Act (a legal document that certifies the computer output was produced in the ordinary course of the computer's functioning).

The trial court admitted the CDs anyway. The Kerala High Court reversed that decision, holding that without the certificate, the CDs were inadmissible. Anvar P.V. appealed to the Supreme Court.

The courtroom in New Delhi was packed that September morning. The bench sat in silence as the counsel for Anvar P.V. argued that the CDs should be seen — that the footage was the best evidence of what had happened. The judges listened, their faces unreadable, the stack of CDs sitting on the clerk's table like a small, silent accusation.

Why a 2011 judgment had muddied the waters

Until 2014, the leading case on electronic evidence was State (NCT of Delhi) v. Navjot Sandhu — the Parliament attack case. In that judgment, the Supreme Court had held that electronic records could be admitted as secondary evidence (a copy of an original document) under Section 63 of the Evidence Act, even without the Section 65B certificate.

That interpretation created a loophole. If a prosecutor could bypass Section 65B by calling the CD a "copy" under Section 63, the certificate requirement became optional. And if it was optional, it was rarely filed.

The Anvar P.V. bench saw the problem. Section 65B was a special provision for computer output. It was not an alternative route — it was the only route. When the judgment was read out, the courtroom fell into a deep quiet. The Court observed that "the Computer Output is not admissible without compliance of Section 65B". It then concluded that the Navjot Sandhu judgment "does not lay down correct position and is required to be overruled".

There was a rustle among the lawyers present. The overruling of Navjot Sandhu was not a small thing — that case had been cited in hundreds of trials, thousands of arguments. Now, in a single sentence, the foundation had shifted.

What Section 65B actually demands

Section 65B of the Evidence Act (a provision that governs how computer-generated information can be used as evidence) has a simple logic: if you cannot bring the computer itself to court, you must bring a certificate that vouches for the computer's reliability.

The certificate must be signed by a person who manages or controls the computer. It must state that the computer was working properly during the period the data was generated, that the data was fed into the computer in the ordinary course of business, and that the output is a true reproduction of that data.

Without this certificate, the electronic record is not admissible — meaning the judge cannot even look at it, let alone rely on it.

The certificate itself is a plain document — a few paragraphs, a signature, a date. But its absence can turn the most damning video into a piece of paper that the judge must ignore.

The exception that proves the rule

Six years later, in Arjun Panditrao Khotkar v. Kailash Kushanrao Gorantyal (decided on July 14, 2020), a three-judge bench clarified an important exception.

The case had its own long procedural history — appeals, cross-appeals, arguments that stretched over months. When the bench finally assembled to deliver its judgment, the courtroom was tense. The question was not new, but the stakes were high: could a person who owned the device simply walk into the witness box and testify, without any certificate?

If the owner of the device — the person whose laptop, tablet, or mobile phone contains the original data — steps into the witness box and testifies to the device's authenticity, no certificate is needed. The original document itself is being produced. Section 65B only applies when you are offering a copy of that original.

But the Court also drew a sharp line: "in cases where the 'computer' happens to be a part of a 'computer system' or 'computer network' and it becomes impossible to physically bring such system or network to the Court, then the only means of providing information contained in such electronic record can be in accordance with Section 65B(1), together with the requisite certificate under Section 65B(4)".

In plain language: if your evidence is stored on a CD, DVD, pen drive, or cloud server — anything that is not the original device — you need the certificate. No exceptions.

The weight of the file on the judge's desk, the smell of old paper and ink, the careful silence as the judgment was read — all of it underscored the finality of the ruling.

When the certificate must be produced

One question remained: what if the police or the party files the certificate late? Is the omission fatal?

In State of Karnataka v. M.R. Hiremath, the Supreme Court answered that question. The High Court had thrown out a prosecution because the Section 65B certificate was not filed with the charge-sheet (the formal document that lists the accusations against the accused). The Supreme Court reversed, holding that "the High Court erred in coming to the conclusion that the failure to produce a certificate under Section 65-B(4) of the Evidence Act at the stage when the charge-sheet was filed was fatal to the prosecution".

The Court clarified: "The need for production of such a certificate would arise when the electronic record is sought to be produced in evidence at the trial. It is at that stage that the necessity of the production of the certificate would arise."

This means the omission is curable — a defect that can be fixed — as long as the certificate is produced before the electronic record is formally offered as evidence during the trial.

The impact of this verdict was to provide a guideline to Trial Courts: the stored electronic data is not admissible without the Section 65B(4) certificate, but the omission is not a death sentence. It can be remedied at the stage of adducing evidence.

What this means for your case

For practitioners, the rule is now settled. If you plan to rely on a screenshot, a video clip, an email printout, a WhatsApp chat export, or any data stored on a device you cannot bring to court, you must arrange for the Section 65B certificate before you try to exhibit that document. Waiting until the judgment stage is too late.

For litigants: do not assume your lawyer will handle this. Ask. If your case turns on a single WhatsApp message, the absence of a certificate can sink your claim.

THE PLAY: Before you file any electronic record as evidence, get the Section 65B(4) certificate signed by the person who controls the device — or bring the device's owner to the witness box.

The Court ended where it began: with a CD, a missing signature, and a rule that no judge can ignore.