Brain mapping: A technique that might reveal Aftab's truths that narco and polygraph couldn't

Brain mapping is a technique used to extract concealed information in the brain by measuring brainwave responses.

New Delhi, Dec 03: After the polygraph and narco analysis tests of Aftab Amin Poonawala did not yield conclusive results, the authorities are planning to conduct the 'brain mapping' test on him next week. Brain mapping is a technique used to extract concealed information stored in the brain by measuring brainwave responses and the test results could help the investigators fetch some crucial information in the Shraddha Walker murder case.

What is brain mapping?
To begin with, brain mapping is known by different names such as P300 waves test or Brain Finger Printing or Brain Electrical Oscillation Signature Profiling Test. It is a method to find out whether a person is concealing any information in the brain by measuring brain activity in response to selected stimuli, according to Forensic's blog. The Society for Brain Mapping & Therapeutics, a non-profit biomedical association defines it as "the study of the anatomy and function of the brain and spinal cord through the use of imaging, immunohistochemistry, molecular and optogenetics, stem cell and cellular biology, engineering, neurophysiology, and nanotechnology."

It further explains that all neuroimaging can be considered part of brain mapping that produces brain images supplemented by the result of additional (imaging or non-imaging) data processing or analysis, such as maps projecting (measures of) behavior onto brain regions.

How it is conducted?
During the brain mapping, the person is first asked several questions to check whether he is concealing any information. Then, the investigator says three types of words.

The first set of words are not directly linked to the case.

The second set of words are "related to the case and suspects to elicit concealed information, which all suspects have had opportunity to come to know during the course of events related to the case" according to Legal Service India. The officers mention words those were not mentioned in first and second parts in the third set of words. The words in this part are based on confidential findings which suspect does not know.

The person's reactions are then recorded and submitted. It has to be noted that brain mapping is completely non-invasive and does not require any chemicals or drugs to be injected into the person.

In short, it is a technique used to detect concealed information stored in the brain by measuring brainwave responses.

Is it Admissible in Court?

The Supreme Court had earlier said that narco-analysis, brain mapping or polygraph tests on an accused are illegal. However, the court permitted use of such truth-finding techniques in criminal cases on consent.

"We hold that no individual should be forcibly subjected to any of the techniques in question, whether in the context of investigation in criminal cases or otherwise. Doing so would amount to an unwarranted intrusion into personal liberty," said a bench comprising chief justice K G Balakrishnan, Justice R V Raveendran and Justice J M Panchal in the case of Selvi vs State of Karnataka.

Shraddha murder case: The background

Aftab Amin Poonawala and Shraddha met through a dating app in 2019. They had travelled together to some places including Himachal Pradesh when they were in Maharashtra. They shifted to Delhi and stayed together in a flat of a man whom they had met in Himachal Pradesh. Her parents were against the inter-faith relationship and had stopped talking to her after she decided to move to Delhi with him.

Police sources have revealed that they had frequent quarrels. She was insisting him for marriage while he was against it. On May 18, during one such argument he lost his temper and strangled her to death.