Citations: Amrit Bhushan Vs Union of India, AIR 1977 SC 608
Date of Judgment: 29/11/1976
Equivalent Citations: 1977 AIR SC 608, 1977 SCR (2) 240
Case No: Criminal Appeal No. 383 of 1976
Case Type: Criminal Appeal
Appellant: Amrit Bhushan
Respondent: Union of India
Bench: Hon’ble Justice M. Hameedullah Beg, Hon’ble Justice A.N Ray, Hon’ble Justice Jaswant Singh
Court: Supreme Court of India
Statutes Referred:
- Indian Penal Code, 1860; Sections 84, 302, 07
- The Constitution of India, 1949; Articles 136, 226
- The Prisoners Act, 1900; Section 30
Cases referred:
- Jagmohan Singh Vs State of U.P [1973] 2 SCR 541
Facts:
- Amrit Bhushan was sentenced to death for burning alive three innocent sleeping children aged 14, 8 and 5 years at Sriniwas Puri on the night of 21st June, 1968 and also attempted to murder Tek Chand Chanana.
- His crime was so heinous that even the extreme penalty of death was appearing too mild for the murder of three children by burning them alive. Delhi High Court also confirmed the death sentence on 23rd September, 1969.
- Amrit Bhushan Gupta’s relatives made the plea of insanity to the High Court but the Hon’ble High Court refused even to entertain this petition of the accused.
- The Supreme Court also dismissed various petitions filed by Amrit Bhushan. Thereafter, numerous mercy petitions were also filed.
- Special leave petition under Article 136 of The Constitution of India was filed taking the defence insanity in the Supreme Court.
Issues Involved:
- Whether the appellant who became insane after conviction and sentence could be executed?
Contention of Appellant:
The counsel for Appellant contented that:
- Convicted person who became insane after conviction and sentence could not be executed until he regained sanity.
- The provisions of Section 30 of The Prisoners Act, 1900, should be applied to the petitioner.
- The learned Counsel has, industriously, collected a number of statements of the position in English law from the abovementioned and other works of several authorities such as Theobald on Lunacy (p. 254), and Kenny’s Criminal Law (p. 74). On the other hand, learned Additional Solicitor General has relied on the following statement of a modern point of view contained in a book by Mr. Nigel Walker on “Crime and Insanity in England” (Vol. I: The Historical Perspective) at p. 213 -214.
Contention of Respondent:
The counsel for Respondent contented that:
- If at the time of the commission of the offence, the appellant knew the nature of the act he was committing, as we assume he did, he could not be absolved of responsibility for the grave offence of murder. A Constitution Bench of this Court has upheld the Constitutional validity of the death penalty in Jagmohan Singh v. The State of UP.
- We have to assume that the appellant was rightly. convicted because he knew the nature of his acts when he committed the offences with which he was charged. The legality or correctness of the sentence of death passed upon him cannot be questioned before us now. So far as the prerogative power of granting a pardon or of remitting the sentence is concerned, it lies elsewhere. We cannot even examine the facts of the case in the proceedings now before us and make any recommendation or reduce the sentence to one of life imprisonment.
- With some great intensity, by learned Counsel for the appellant, is that a convicted person who becomes insane after his conviction and sentence cannot be executed at all at least until he regains sanity. In support of this contention learned Counsel has quoted the passage from Hale’s Pleas of the Crown Vol. I–p. 33, a passage from Coke’s Institutes, Vol. III, p. 6 and a passage from a modern work, ‘An Introduction to Criminal Law”, by Rupert Cross, (1959), p. 67.
Judgment:
The Supreme Court agreed with the High Court observation that authorities concerned are expected to look into matters which lie within their powers. And, as the President of India has rejected the appellant’s mercy petitions, the court presumed that all relevant facts and matter have been looked into by the authorities and the death sentence could not be stopped.
Accordingly, the appeal was dismissed.
Ratio Decidendi:
- The Courts have no power to prohibit the carrying out of a sentence of death legally passed upon an accused person on the ground either that there is some rule in the Common Law of England against the execution of an insane person sentenced to death or some theological, religious, or moral objection to it.
- Our statute law on the subject is based entirely on secular considerations which place the protection and welfare of society in the forefront.
- The question whether, on that facts and circumstances of a particular ease, a convict, alleged to have become insane, appears to be so dangerous that he, must not be let loose upon society, lest he commits similar crimes against other innocent persons when released, or, because of his antecedents and character, or, for some other reason, he deserves a different treatment, are matters for other authorities to, consider after a Court has duly passed its sentence.
- Insanity, to be recognised as an exception to criminal liability must be such as to disable an accused person from knowing the character of the act he was committing when he commits a criminal act. If, at the time of the commission of the offence, the appellant knew the nature of the act he was committing, he could not be absolved of responsibility for the grave offence of murder.
- As the High Court rightly observed, the authorities concerned are expected to look into matters which lie within their powers. And, as the President of India has already rejected the appellant’s mercy petitions.
Conclusion:
To conclude, it is a well-established fact that the petitioner at the time of commission of the offence was well aware of the consequences of his action and only later did he become insane. Under Section 84 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 if the person knows about the nature of the offence, he shall be held liable. Insanity is subsequent to the commission of offence in question does not being the act under defence under this Section.
Drafted By: Kimi Kantak, Govind Ramnath Kare College of Law
Edited by: Aashima Kakkar, Associate Editor, Law Insider
Published On: November 08, 2021 at 18:54 IST