Skip to main content

Mens Rea not needed to constitute offense of medical negligence

In Prabhat Kumar Singh vs The State Of Bihar And Ors. Etc, appeals were filed before the Supreme Court against the judgment and order dated passed by the High Court of Judicature at Patna, whereby the summoning order passed by the Court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate, Patna was set aside.

The appellant had filed a complaint before the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate's Court at Patna against the private respondents for offence punishable under Section 304, 316/34 of the Indian Penal Code. The Trial Court after recording the evidence of three witnesses produced by the complainant and other materials on record, was persuaded to issue summons to the private respondents in connection with the stated offence vide order dated 24.12.2016. The private respondents, therefore, assailed that order by way of writ petitions before the High Court.

The SC held that the High Court, in our opinion, completely glossed over the reasons which had weighed with the Trial Court as noted in order dated 24.12.2016, but was impressed by the fact that there was no evidence regarding mens rea, to show malicious or bad intent. This view taken by the High Court is erroneous. For, when it is a case of medical negligence, it need not be because of mens rea as intent. Sans mens rea in the above sense also it would still constitute offence of medical negligence.

Comments

Post a Comment

Most viewed this month

Appellate authorities under Special Statutes cannot be asked to condone delay

Madras High Court in R.Gowrishankar vs. The Commissioner of Service Tax has held that Appellate authorities cannot be asked to condone the delay, beyond the extended period of limitation A Division Bench comprising of Justices S. Manikumar and D. Krishnakumar, made this observation while considering an appeal filed against Single Bench order declining to set aside the order made in the condone delay petition filed by the petitioner to condone 223 days in filing the appeal before the Commissioner of Service Tax (Appeals). Article referred: http://www.livelaw.in/appellate-authorities-special-statutes-cannot-asked-condone-delay-beyond-extended-period-limitation-madras-hc/
Post a Comment
Read more

'Seize assets to pay damages to accident victim'

Her story might be an inspiration for the physically challenged but justice has remained elusive for her. In 2008, a bus accident left research engineer S Thenmozhi, 30, paraplegic. In April 2013, the motor accident claims tribunal directed the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) to provide her a compensation of 57.9 lakh. However, TNSTC refused to budge and on Tuesday a city court ordered attaching of movable assets of the transport corporation. Thenmozhi was employed in C-DOT, a telecom technology development centre in Bangalore. On July 21, 2008, she was coming to Chennai in a private bus. Around 2am, the bus had a flat tyre and the driver parked it on the left side of the road near Pallikonda in Vellore district on the Bangalore-Chennai highway. While the tyre was being changed, a TNSTC bus of Dharmapuri division hit the stationary bus. The rear part of the bus was smashed and passengers were injured. Thenmozhi who had a seat at the back of the bus suffered...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mumbai ITAT rules income of offshore discretionary trust is subject to tax in India

The Mumbai Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) has recently determined the following issue in the affirmative in the case of Manoj Dhupelia: Should the income of an offshore discretionary trust be subject to tax in India, if no distributions have been made to beneficiaries in India? The question arose from appeals filed by individual beneficiaries in relation to a Lichtenstein-based trust, the Ambrunova Trust and Merlyn Management SA (the Trust) with the ITAT. It is important to note that the individuals in this case were amongst those first identified by the Government of India (GOI) as holding undeclared bank accounts in Lichtenstein. The ITAT ruling raises the following issues: Taxation of Trust Corpus: ITAT classified the corpus of the trust as "undisclosed income" and declared it taxable in the hands of the beneficiaries. Taxation of Undistributed Income: ITAT refused to draw a distinction between the corpus and undistributed income from the trust and declared i...
Post a Comment
Read more