NDLI: M. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

Content Provider	Supreme Court of India
e-ISSN	30484839
Language	English
Access Restriction	NDLI
Subject Keyword	Suicide Abetment of suicide
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Law Judgement
Jurisdiction	India
Act(s) Referred	Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (1 of 1872) Indian Penal Code (45 of 1860)
Case(s) Referred	Referred Case 0 Referred Case 1 Referred Case 2 Referred Case 3 Referred Case 4
Case Type	Appeal
Court	Supreme Court of India
Disposal Nature	Appeal Allowed
Headnote	Penal Code, 1860 – s. 306 – Abetment of suicide – Conviction u/s. 306, when sustainable – Prosecution case that the appellant and others abducted and wrongful confined the victim for repayment of the balance amount and the inability to withstand the torment, he committed suicide – Conviction of the appellant u/ss. 306, 342 and 365 by the trial court, however, the High Court acquitted him for the offence u/ss. 342 and 365 but upheld conviction for the offence u/s. 306 – Sustainability: Held: One has to consider the mens rea of the accused/convict to bring about suicide of the victim – It requires an active act or direct act which led the victim to commit suicide seeing no option; and the act must have been of such a degree intending to push the deceased into such a position that he/she committed suicide – Gravamen of the offence punishable u/s. 306, is abetting suicide – Abetment imposes a mental process of instigating a person or initially aiding a person in doing the offence – Evidence of the prosecution witness did not reveal existence of the element of mens rea on the part of the appellant abetting the deceased to commit suicide – There is nothing in their oral testimonies which would suggest that the appellant had instigated the deceased to commit suicide – Though the prosecution got a case that one person had witnessed the appellant taking the victim and wrongfully confining him in the said shop, the said person was not examined by the prosecution – At any rate, the fact is that the appellant was already acquitted for the offence u/s. 342 and 365 IPC – s. 106 of the Evidence Act cannot be used to shift the burden of proving the offence from the prosecution to the accused – High Court erred in applying s. 106 – Thus, there is absolute absence of any basis for its application against the appellant in view of the evidence on record – Prosecution miserably failed to establish that the appellant had abetted the victim to commit suicide – Conviction of the appellant u/s. 306, IPC cannot be sustained – Appellants conviction u/s. 306 quashed and set aside and he is acquitted. [Paras 14, 17-22] Criminal law – Mens rea – Meaning of:Held: Mens rea means a guilty mind – As a general rule, every crime requires a mental element, the nature of which, will depend upon definition of the particular crime in question – Although it is impossible to ascribe any particular meaning to the term ‘mens rea’ as the circumstance to determine the existence of mens rea depends upon the ingredients constituting the particular offence and the expression used in the definition of the particular offence to constitute such offence. [Para 15] Evidence Act, 1872 – s. 106 – Burden of proving fact especially within knowledge – Application of s. 106: Held: Section 106 is an exception to the general rule laid down in s. 101 which casts burden of proving a fact on the party who substantially asserts the affirmative of the issue – s. 106 is not intended to relieve any person of that duty or burden – It says that when a fact to be proved, either affirmatively or negatively, is especially within the knowledge of a person, it is for him to prove it – s. 106 in its application to criminal cases, applies where the defence of the accused depends on his proving a fact especially within his knowledge and of nobody else – s.106 cannot be used to shift the burden of proving the offence from the prosecution to the accused – It can only when the prosecution led evidence, which, if believed, will sustain a conviction or which makes out a prima facie case, that the question of shifting the onus to prove such facts on the accused would arise. [Para 18]
Judge	Hon'ble Mr. Justice C.T. Ravikumar
Neutral Citation	2024 INSC 177
Petitioner	M. Vijayakumar
Respondent	State Of Tamil Nadu
SCR	[2024] 2 S.C.R. 1054
Judgement Date	2024-02-21
Case Number	1078

Sl.	Authority	Responsibilities	Communication Details
1	Ministry of Education (GoI), Department of Higher Education	Sanctioning Authority	https://www.education.gov.in/ict-initiatives
2	Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	Host Institute of the Project: The host institute of the project is responsible for providing infrastructure support and hosting the project	https://www.iitkgp.ac.in
3	National Digital Library of India Office, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	The administrative and infrastructural headquarters of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in
4	Project PI / Joint PI	Principal Investigator and Joint Principal Investigators of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in Prof. Saswat Chakrabarti will be added soon
5	Website/Portal (Helpdesk)	Queries regarding NDLI and its services	support@ndl.gov.in
6	Contents and Copyright Issues	Queries related to content curation and copyright issues	content@ndl.gov.in
7	National Digital Library of India Club (NDLI Club)	Queries related to NDLI Club formation, support, user awareness program, seminar/symposium, collaboration, social media, promotion, and outreach	clubsupport@ndl.gov.in
8	Digital Preservation Centre (DPC)	Assistance with digitizing and archiving copyright-free printed books	dpc@ndl.gov.in
9	IDR Setup or Support	Queries related to establishment and support of Institutional Digital Repository (IDR) and IDR workshops	idr@ndl.gov.in

M. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

Please Log-in to view this content

Mankamma Vs. State of Kerala

N. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

Kuldeep Kaur Vs. State of Utiarakhand

Naresh Kumar Vs. State of Haryana

Gurnaib Singh Vs. State of Punjab

Rajeev Kumar Vs. State of Haryana

Gurucharan Kumar and Anr. Vs. State of Rajasthan

Kanchan Sharma Vs. State of Uttar Pradesh & Anr.

Prabhat Kumar Mishra @ Prabhat Mishra Vs. The State of U.p. & Anr.

M. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

M. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

Please Log-in to view this content

Similar Documents

Mankamma Vs. State of Kerala

N. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu

Kuldeep Kaur Vs. State of Utiarakhand

Naresh Kumar Vs. State of Haryana

Gurnaib Singh Vs. State of Punjab

Rajeev Kumar Vs. State of Haryana

Gurucharan Kumar and Anr. Vs. State of Rajasthan

Kanchan Sharma Vs. State of Uttar Pradesh & Anr.

Prabhat Kumar Mishra @ Prabhat Mishra Vs. The State of U.p. & Anr.

M. Vijayakumar Vs. State of Tamil Nadu