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Offences Affecting the Human Body

(Chapter XVI 299 to 377)

CULPABLE HOMICIDE (S 299)

QUESTION BANK

Q1.     When ‘culpable homicide’ is not amounting to ‘murder’?

Q2.     What is murder when does ‘culpable homicide’ not amount to murder?

Q3.     Define and distinguish between ‘Culpable Homicide’ and Murder, referring to decided cases.

Q4. What is Murder? Distinguish it from culpable homicide.

Q5. Explain and illustrate ‘Death caused by rash and negligent act’.

SHORT NOTES

1. Culpable Homicide

SYNOPSIS

I] ‘Culpable Homicide’ (S. 299)

II] Punishment

III]     There, are following three explanations to this section, viz-

‘Culpable Homicide’ by causing death of person other than person whose death

is intended (S.301)

I] ‘CULPABLE HOMICIDE (S. 299):-

    There are three types of unlawful homicides.

i) S.299 defines ‘‘Culpable Homicide Simplicitor’;

ii) S.300 defines ‘murder’, whereas,

iii) exceptions to S. 300 clauses (1) to (4) provide for the circumstances

when ‘Culpable Homicide’ does not amount to murder’.

In both ‘culpable homicide’ and ‘murder,’ causing death is common, and there is the necessity of criminal intention or knowledge in both.

    Culpable homicide is the first kind of unlawful homicide. S. 299 provides that-

Whoever causes death by doing an act -

i) With the intention of causing death or

ii) With the intention of causing such bodily injury as is likely to cause

death.

iii) With the knowledge that he is likely by such an act to cause death.

Commits culpable homicide (S. 299).

II]    PUNISHMENT:-

If the offence falls under clauses (1) and (2), the punishment is imprisonment for life or up to 10 years and a fine. However, suppose the offence falls in the clause (3) category and is committed without the intention of causing the death (i.e., there is mere knowledge of causing death without intention). In that case, the punishment is imprisonment for up to 10 years, a fine, or both (S. 304).

Illustration

    a)     A lays sticks and turf over a pit with the intention of thereby causing death or with the knowledge that death is likely to be thereby caused. Z, believing the ground to be firm, treads on it, falls in and is killed. A has committed the offence of culpable homicide.

b)    A knows Z to be behind a bush. B does not know it. A, intending to cause or knowing it to be likely to cause Z's death, induces B to fire at the bush. B fires and kills Z. Here, B may be guilty of no offence, but A has committed the offence of culpable homicide.

c)     A, by shooting at a fowl with intent to kill and steal it, kills B, who is behind a bush; A does not know that B is there. Here, although A was doing an unlawful act, he was not guilty of culpable homicide, as he did not intend to kill B or cause death by doing an act that he knew was likely to cause death.

Illustrations a) and b) to S. 299 give examples of ‘Culpable Homicide’ accompanied by the first or third species. Illustrations c) show that unless one or other of the three species is present, there can be no culpable homicide.

        “Intention of causing death” in clause (i) of S. 299 above is also prima facie murder within the express words of S. 300. Rest of the clauses, i.e. (ii) and (iii) of S. 299, do not provide for strong intention to cause death but the likeliness of causing it. This element of mens rea makes the difference between ‘murder’ and ‘‘Culpable Homicide’’.

III]    There are the following three explanations for this Section, viz-

1)     A person who causes bodily injury to another, who is labouringly under a disorder, disease, or bodily infirmity and thereby accelerates the death of another, is deemed to have caused his death.

    Thus, if A, while suffering from an incurable disease, is violently assaulted by B, even after knowing of A’s incurable disease, and A dies in a few days, B has killed A. Therefore, B is guilty of culpable homicide.

2)     Where death is caused by bodily injury, the person who causes such bodily injury is deemed to have caused the death, although by resorting to proper remedies and skilful treatment, the death might have been prevented.

    Thus, if A deliberately inflicts an injury on B, likely to result in death, B refuses to allow a surgeon to perform an operation on the wound. B dies of the infection in that wound. A has killed B and, therefore, is guilty under this section.

    But the connection between the injury and the death must not be too remote.

3) The causing of the death of a child in the mother’s womb is not homicide. But it may amount to culpable homicide to cause the death of the living child if any part of that child has been brought forth, though the child may not have breathed or been completely born.

    As defined by S. 10, ‘man’ denotes a male human being of any age, and ‘woman’ denotes a female human being of any age. Therefore, causing the death of a child just born is similarly serious as causing the death of a fully grown human being. As soon as any part of a child has been brought forth from the mother’s womb, the child is considered a living human being.

In Emperor V/s Falani

Facts:- the accused struck his wife a blow on the head with a plough sphere, which, though not shown to be a blow likely to cause death, made her unconscious. He believed her to be dead. The accused hanged her on a beam by a rope to make a false defence of suicide by hanging, thereby causing her death by strangulation.

Held:- that the accused was not guilty of culpable homicide but convicted him of grievous hurt.

In Vasant’s case

Facts:- The accused administered a single knife blow right on the chest of the deceased with such great force that the ribs were cut, and both the heart and lung were punctured.

Held: The accused was held liable for culpable homicide, not amounting to murder since he had inflicted a single knife blow.

Culpable Homicide’ by Causing Death of a Person other than Person Whose

Death is Intended (S.301):-

    S.301 embodies a well-established principle of criminal jurisprudence based on the doctrine of transferred malice. It provides that ‘if a person by doing anything which he intends or knows to be likely to cause death, commits the culpable homicide by causing the death of any other person, whose death he neither intends nor knows himself to be likely to cause’, is punishable similarly as the culpable homicide of intended person.

    Thus, if A intends to kill B but kills C, whose death he neither intends nor knows himself to be likely to cause, the intention to kill C is, by law, attributed to him and be

held guilty of culpable homicide.

    However, the rule laid down under S. 301 cannot well be stated as an explanation to either S.299 or S.300, but it relates to both, i.e., for murder and culpable homicide.

In Gyanendra Kumar’s Case

Facts: - The accused was deliberately trying to shoot at a fleeing man who had criticised his father in a school committee meeting, but unfortunately, his own maternal uncle came in between him and the intended victim and thus got killed.

Held: - That the act of the accused was nothing but murder under S. 302, read with

S. 301.                        

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