A High Court, while dealing with a plea to quash FIRs, should not go into the question of requisite mens rea (intention) of an accused to commit a crime even before the investigation is complete or the chargesheet, if any, is filed, the Supreme Court has held.
The recent judgment by a Bench of Justices U.U. Lalit and D.Y. Chandrachud is based on a plea filed by the father of a school teacher whose husband, also a teacher in the same zila parishad school in Maharashtra, committed suicide.
Prosecution’ stand
The prosecution version is that the man took his own life unable to bear the harassment meted out to his wife by their colleague. A few days before his death in 2015, the husband had had a verbal altercation with the alleged harasser, but to no avail. The man, according to the police, kept on calling the deceased’s wife. Finally, unable to take the pressure on his marital life, he took the fatal step leaving a suicide note naming the harasser.
The police registered a case of abetment to suicide against the accused teacher. He however successfully moved the Bombay High Court to quash the FIR against him. The High Court, in its order in March 2016, recorded that there was no prima facie material to establish that the accused male teacher “had either an intention to aid or instigate or abet” the suicide. Quashing the FIR, the High Court said even the suicide note did not indicate any instigation or abetment on the part of the accused to drive the husband to suicide.
Order to police
Disagreeing with the High Court, Justice Lalit, speaking for the Bench, ordered the police to complete the investigation. The Bench said the High Court should not have gone into whether there was requisite intention on part of the respondent (accused teacher) when the investigation was yet to be completed and chargesheet, if any, was yet to be filed.
“There are definite allegations that the respondent would keep on calling the wife of the victim on her mobile and keep harassing her which allegations are supported by the statements of the mother and the wife of the victim recorded during investigation,” the apex court observed, adding that the suicide note had made a “definite allegation” against the accused.
