Say the ratio out loud before you open Reasoning — recalling it unprompted is exactly what the exam pays for.
Why it matters
The competency section is short and generous. All persons are competent to testify unless the Court considers that they are prevented from understanding the questions put to them, or from giving rational answers, by tender years, extreme old age, disease of body or mind, or any other cause of the same kind; and the Explanation makes clear that a lunatic is not incompetent unless his lunacy prevents that understanding.
That leaves the practical question examiners ask: what happens when the formalities are not observed — when a witness, most often a child, gives evidence without being administered an oath? Is the evidence a nullity, or is it evidence of lesser value? Rameshwar settles it.
Facts
Evidence had been given by a witness to whom the oath had not been administered, and the question was the effect of that omission on the evidence.
Held
An omission to administer an oath, even to an adult, goes only to the credibility of the witness and not to his competency.
Reasoning
Step one — competency is defined by understanding, not by ceremony. The section fixes a single test: can the witness understand the questions put to him and answer them rationally? Competency to testify is a prerequisite to being administered an oath, which shows the order of the two ideas. The oath follows competency; it does not create it.
Step two — the section is not about admissibility or credit. The section is concerned with the competency of a person to be a witness. It is not concerned with the admissibility of the testimony, nor with its credibility. An omission of the oath therefore cannot affect the first question at all, and can affect only the last.
Step three — the consequence. The evidence stands. It is received, and the omission is a circumstance the Court weighs when deciding how much of it to believe.
Exam use
This is the anchor case for the competency half of the witnesses module. State the test from BSA s. 124, then Rameshwar for the proposition that formal defects go to credit.
It slots straight into the child-witness line of authority. A child witness is a privileged witness and may not have to take an oath; the voire dire, in which the court puts preliminary questions unconnected with the case to gauge the child's competency, is not essential but is desirable, and a judge may put a few such questions on record, including questions to find out whether the child has a rough idea of the difference between truth and falsehood. Rameshwar is what makes the omission of the oath survivable in those cases.
Remember also the neighbouring provision. Under BSA s. 125 (IEA s. 119) a witness who is unable to speak may give evidence in writing or by signs, made in open Court, and evidence so given is deemed to be oral evidence — the section applies equally to a person who can speak but has undertaken not to, for instance on a day of observed silence.
It does not decide that unsworn evidence is as good as sworn evidence, and it does not relieve the Court of its duty to scrutinise the testimony.