44. Lastly, comes the question whether the entries are “admissions” within the meaning of Section 17 of the Act so as to be admissible as relevant evidence under Section 21; and if so, as against whom can the entries be proved. In Section 17 admission has been defined to be a statement, oral or documentary, which suggests any inference as to any fact in issue or relevant fact and which is made by any of the persons, and under the circumstances, mentioned in the subsequent sections (Sections 18 to 21). Section 18, so far as it is relevant for our present purposes, provides that statements made by a party to the proceeding, or by an agent to any such party, whom the Court regards, under the circumstances of the case, as expressly or impliedly authorised by him to make them, are admissions. Section 21 reads as under:

“21. Proof of admissions against persons making them, and by or on their behalf.—Admissions are relevant and may be proved as against the person who makes them, or his representative in interest; but they cannot be proved by or on behalf of the person who makes them or by his representative in interest, except in the following cases:

(1) An admission may be proved by or on behalf of the person making it, when it is of such a nature that, if the person making it were dead, it would be relevant as between third persons under Section 32.

(2) An admission may be proved by or on behalf of the person making it, when it consists of a statement of the existence of any state of mind or body, relevant or in issue, made at or about the time when such state of mind or body existed, and is accompanied by conduct rendering its falsehood improbable.

(3) An admission may be proved by or on behalf of the person making it, if it is relevant otherwise than as an admission.”

From a combined reading of the above sections it is manifest that an oral or documentary statement made by a party or his authorised agent, suggesting any inference as to any fact in issue or relevant fact may be proved against a party to the proceeding or his authorised agent as “admission” but, apart from exceptional cases (as contained in Section 21), such a statement cannot be proved by or on their behalf. While on this point the distinction between “admission” and “confession” needs to be appreciated. In absence of any definition of “confession” in the Act judicial opinion, as to its exact meaning, was not unanimous until the Judicial Committee made an authoritative pronouncement about the same in Pakala Narayana Swami v. Emperor [AIR 1939 PC 47 : (1939) 40 Cri LJ 364] with these words:

“[A] confession must either admit in terms the offence, or at any rate substantially all the facts which constitute the offence. An admission of a gravely incriminating fact, even a conclusively incriminating fact, is not of itself a confession, e.g., an admission that the accused is the owner of and was in recent possession of the knife or revolver which caused a death with no explanation of any other man’s possession. Some confusion appears to have been caused by the definition of ‘confession’ in Article 22 of the Stephen’s ‘Digest of the Law of Evidence’ which defines a confession as ‘an admission made at any time by a person charged with a crime stating or suggesting the inference that he committed that crime’. If the surrounding articles are examined it will be apparent that the learned author, after dealing with admissions generally, is applying himself to admissions in criminal cases, and for this purpose defines confessions so as to cover all such admissions, in order to have a general term for use in the three following articles, confession secured by inducement, made upon oath, made under a promise of secrecy. The definition is not contained in the Evidence Act, 1872, and in that Act it would not be consistent with the natural use of language to construe confession as a statement by an accused ‘suggesting the inference that he committed’ the crime.”

The above statement of law has been approved and consistently followed by this Court. (Palvinder Kaur v. State of Punjab [AIR 1952 SC 354 : 1953 SCR 94] , Om Prakash v. State of U.P. [AIR 1960 SC 409 : 1960 Cri LJ 544] and Veera Ibrahim v. State of Maharashtra [(1976) 2 SCC 302 : 1976 SCC (Cri) 278 : (1976) 3 SCR 672] .)

45. It is thus seen that only voluntary and direct acknowledgement of guilt is a confession but when a confession falls short of actual admission of guilt it may nevertheless be used as evidence against the person who made it or his authorised agent as an “admission” under Section 21. The law in this regard has been clearly — and in our considered view correctly — explained in Monir’s Law of Evidence (New Edn. at pp. 205 and 206), on which Mr Jethmalani relied to bring home his contention that even if the entries are treated as “admission” of the Jains still they cannot be used against Shri Advani. The relevant passage reads as under:

“The distinction between admissions and confessions is of considerable importance for two reasons. Firstly, a statement made by an accused person, if it is an admission, is admissible in evidence under Section 21 of the Evidence Act, unless the statement amounts to a confession and was made to a person in authority in consequence of some improper inducement, threat or promise, or was made to a Police Officer, or was made at a time when the accused was in custody of a Police Officer. If a statement was made by the accused in the circumstances just mentioned its admissibility will depend upon the determination of the question whether it does not amount to a confession. If it amounts to a confession, it will be inadmissible, but if it does not amount to a confession, it will be admissible under Section 21 of the Act as an admission, provided that it suggests an inference as to a fact which is in issue in, or relevant to, the case and was not made to a Police Officer in the course of an investigation under Chapter XIV of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Secondly, a statement made by an accused person is admissible against others who are being jointly tried with him only if the statement amounts to a confession. Where the statement falls short of a confession, it is admissible only against its maker as an admission and not against those who are being jointly tried with him. Therefore, from the point of view of Section 30 of the Evidence Act also the distinction between an admission and a confession is of fundamental importance.”