A
boy proposes to a girl. She rejects it. Feeling humiliated by the
manner in which she rejects his proposition, the boy commits suicide.
Should she be prosecuted for abetment to suicide?
Actress Jia Khan's suicide has once again brought to fore a question - what constitutes abetment to suicide? - which has been discussed extensively by the Supreme Court through the decades.
The Supreme Court has consistently held that a word uttered in a fit of anger or emotion without intending to trigger a step as extreme as suicide can't be said to be abetment to suicide.
The SC has also consistently clarified that to prosecute a person for abetment to suicide, prosecution has to prove that the accused had the intention and knowledge that a specific act on his part could trigger suicidal tendency in the victim.
Normal marital skirmishes or what the court put it as "normal wear and tear of marriage" could not be counted as a reason for abetment of suicide by a partner.
Discussing in detail in the case - State of West Bengal vs Orilal Jaiswal [(1994) 1 SCC 73], the SC had cautioned that the court should be extremely careful in assessing the facts and circumstances of each case and the evidence for the purpose of finding whether cruelty meted out to the victim had in fact induced her to commit suicide.
"If it appears to the court that a victim committing suicide was hypersensitive to ordinary petulance, discord and differences in domestic life quite common to the society to which the victim belonged and such petulance, discord and differences were not expected to induce a similarly circumstanced individual in a given society to commit suicide, the conscience of the court should not be satisfied for basing a finding that the accused charged of abetting the offence of suicide should be found guilty," it had said.
Just three years ago, the Supreme Court in S S Chheena Vs Vijay Kumar Mahajan had said that there had to be a positive act on the part of the accused to instigate the victim to take the extreme step of taking her own life.
"Abetment involves a mental process of instigating a person or intentionally aiding a person in doing of a thing. Without a positive act on the part of the accused to instigate or aid in committing suicide, conviction cannot be sustained," it had said.
In its 2001 judgment (Ramesh Kumar Vs Chhattisgarh), the Supreme Court dealt with a classic case. After a domestic quarrel, the husband told the wife - "you are free to do whatever you wish and go wherever you like". The wife committed suicide and husband faced abetment charges.
The Court quashed the charges against the husband and said: "The present one is not a case where the accused had by his acts or omission or by a continued course of conduct created such circumstances that the deceased was left with no other option except to commit suicide in which case instigation may have been inferred. A word uttered in the fit of anger or emotion without intending the consequences to actually follow cannot be said to be instigation."
Actress Jia Khan's suicide has once again brought to fore a question - what constitutes abetment to suicide? - which has been discussed extensively by the Supreme Court through the decades.
The Supreme Court has consistently held that a word uttered in a fit of anger or emotion without intending to trigger a step as extreme as suicide can't be said to be abetment to suicide.
The SC has also consistently clarified that to prosecute a person for abetment to suicide, prosecution has to prove that the accused had the intention and knowledge that a specific act on his part could trigger suicidal tendency in the victim.
Normal marital skirmishes or what the court put it as "normal wear and tear of marriage" could not be counted as a reason for abetment of suicide by a partner.
Discussing in detail in the case - State of West Bengal vs Orilal Jaiswal [(1994) 1 SCC 73], the SC had cautioned that the court should be extremely careful in assessing the facts and circumstances of each case and the evidence for the purpose of finding whether cruelty meted out to the victim had in fact induced her to commit suicide.
"If it appears to the court that a victim committing suicide was hypersensitive to ordinary petulance, discord and differences in domestic life quite common to the society to which the victim belonged and such petulance, discord and differences were not expected to induce a similarly circumstanced individual in a given society to commit suicide, the conscience of the court should not be satisfied for basing a finding that the accused charged of abetting the offence of suicide should be found guilty," it had said.
Just three years ago, the Supreme Court in S S Chheena Vs Vijay Kumar Mahajan had said that there had to be a positive act on the part of the accused to instigate the victim to take the extreme step of taking her own life.
"Abetment involves a mental process of instigating a person or intentionally aiding a person in doing of a thing. Without a positive act on the part of the accused to instigate or aid in committing suicide, conviction cannot be sustained," it had said.
In its 2001 judgment (Ramesh Kumar Vs Chhattisgarh), the Supreme Court dealt with a classic case. After a domestic quarrel, the husband told the wife - "you are free to do whatever you wish and go wherever you like". The wife committed suicide and husband faced abetment charges.
The Court quashed the charges against the husband and said: "The present one is not a case where the accused had by his acts or omission or by a continued course of conduct created such circumstances that the deceased was left with no other option except to commit suicide in which case instigation may have been inferred. A word uttered in the fit of anger or emotion without intending the consequences to actually follow cannot be said to be instigation."
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