Synopsis Safeguarding the rights of the accused in criminal trials is important to ensure that innocent people are not convicted and the faith of people in the criminal justice system remains intact. A significant way to safeguard the rights of the accused and ensuring a fair trial is the exclusion of unfairly prejudicial evidence. Rule 403 of the Federal Rules of Evidence in the United States makes evidence inadmissible if its probative value is outweighed by the prejudice it might cause to the accused.1 Unfortunately, the Indian Evidence Act of 1872 does not contain any corresponding provision for the exclusion of unfairly prejudicial evidence. As per Section 136 of the Act, the power to decide as to the admissibility of evidence vests entirely with the Judge and though there are some provisions which make unfairly prejudicial evidence inadmissible, the word ‘prejudicial’ has not been used anywhere. Though th ....