2. What is the definition of assault?
• S 351 – A threat or apprehension of threat of us of force about to be used against
a person by the accused. The gist of the offence lies on the effect which the
threat creates in the mind of the victim.
According to the illustration, the act of unloosing the muzzle of a ferocious dog,
intending or knowing it to be likely cause a person to believe that he is about to
cause a dog attack is an assault.
• Mere words do not amount to assault. The words must be accompanied by
gestures or preparations that amount to an assault. According to the illustration,
if a person holds up a stick and says, ‘I will give you a beating’, it amounts to
assault due to the gesture. If there is no gesture, there is no assault.
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3. What is the punishment for assault?
• S 352 – Imprisonment 3 month or fine or both.
3
4. What is the section for assault/criminal force
to protect woman against indecent behaviour?
• S 354 – Assault/criminal force that outrages a woman’s modesty shall
be punished with imprisonment up to 2 years or with a fine or both.
• S 509 – Words, gestures or act intending to insult modesty of any
woman shall be punished with simple imprisonment up to 1 year or
with fine or both.
Elements?
• There is an extra element in which there must be intention to outrage
the woman’s modesty or with the knowledge that it was likely to
outrage her modesty.
4
5. Act of fingering of a baby is considered as an
outrage to her modesty in the case of...
• State of Punjab v Major Singh
Facts: Respondent fingered a baby and held guilty for causing hurt.
Held: Conviction altered to assault/criminal force that is intended to
outrage her modesty. The outrage does not necessarily must be felt
or made by the victim herself but it is according to any other woman
in the presence of it on the common notions of mankind.
5
6. Slapping a woman on her posterior amounted
to ooutraging her modesty in the case of...
• Rupan Deol Bajaj v Kanwar Pal Singh Gill
6
7. CRIMINAL LAW FLASHCARDS
Murder & Culpable Homicide
Made by: Nur Aliah bt Amran
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Content
1. Definition
2. Illustration
3. Explanation
4. Difference between murder and
culpable homicide
5. Whether the accused desire the results
do not matter in the case of murder
8. What is culpable homicide?
• S 299 – Culpable homicide is an act of intentionally causing death or
with the intentionally cause bodily injury that is likely to cause death,
or with the knowledge that he is likely by such act to cause death.
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9. Explain briefly the illustrations provided for
culpable homicide
• S 299(a) – In this illustration, A has the intention and knowledge that
his acts would be likely to cause death [A lays sticks over a pit].
• S 299(b) – In this illustration, A has knowledge that his action will
cause death [A tells B to shoot at a bush].
• S 299(C) – A has no intention nor knowledge that his act will cause
death [A shoots at bush thinking it was a fowl, but it turns out to be a
person].
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10. Other areas which fall under culpable
homicide
• Accelerating a disorder, disease or bodily infirmity through bodily
injury – deemed to cause the death [S 299 Explanation 1].
• Victim refuses to take proper remedies and skilful treatment for the
bodily injury – the accused deemed to cause the death [S 299
Explanation 2].
• Causing the death of living child, when any part of the child has been
brought forth, though the child may not have breathed, or been
completely born [S 299 Explanation 3].
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11. Punishment for culpable homicide
• S 304 – Imprisonment for life or imprisonment that may extend to 10
years and fine or both.
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12. What is murder?
• S 300 – When an act to cause death is done with intention to cause
death, or done with intention to cause bodily injury to be likely to
cause death, or done with intention to cause bodily injury that is
sufficient in the ordinary course of nature to cause death or the
person committing the act knows it is so imminently dangerous that it
must all in probability cause death.
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13. • S 300(a) – A has intention and knowledge and the bodily injury is
imminently dangerous to cause death [A shoots Z].
• S 300(b) – A has intention and knowledge and that bodily injury is
sufficient knowing the disease of Z; murder. A does not know the
disease of Z; culpable homicide.
• S 300(c) – A intentionally causes a cut wound that is sufficient to
cause death; murder, even if A did not have intention to cause death.
• S 300(d) – A fires a loaded cannon into a crowd and kills one person’
murder, even if he did not have premeditation to kill any particular
individual.
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Explain briefly the illustrations provided for
murder
14. Difference between culpable homicide or
murder?
• Reg v Govinda, Melville J - It depends on the degree of risk to human
life. If death is likely result, it is culpable homicide; if it is the most
probable result, it is murder [Accused struck victim with his fists].
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15. Murder: Does it matter if the accused ‘desire’
the results or not?
• No.
• R v Nedrick, Lord Lane CJ – To convict for murder, it does not matter
whether the accused has little desire for death to happen, as long as
he realises that his act would inevitably result in death or serious
harm [Accused set letter box of woman’s house on fire, fire spread
and killed her child].
• Hyam v Director of Public Prosecutions, Lord Hailsham LC – It does
not matter in such circumstances whether the defendant desires
those consequences to ensue or not.
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17. Which section of PC that provides this?
• S 300, exception 1: Culpable homicide is not murder when offender,
while
a) deprived of the power of self-control by grave and sudden provocation,
causes the death of the person who gave the provocation; or
b) causes the death of any other person by mistake or accident.
• The authors of IPC said: Homicide committed in the sudden heat of
passion on great provocation ought to be punished to teach men o
respect human life but that in general it ought not to be punished so
severely as murder.
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18. What are the provisos it is subjected to?
1. Provocation not sought or voluntarily provoked by offender as an
excuse for killing or doing harm to any person [provocation sought
is not a provocation].
2. Provocation not done legally or by public servant in lawful exercise
of his power [public servant arresting/interrogating is not
provocation].
3. Provocation not done in the lawful exercise of right of private
defense [someone becomes aggressive for private-defense; not
provocation].
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19. K M Nanavati v State of Maharashtra
• Facts: In the case, the accused had sufficient time for him to regain
his self-control before shooting the man whom his wife has cheated
with [he went to his ship to get the revolver and went to the guy’s
apartment]. This shows his conduct is a deliberate and calculated
one.
• Held: Exception 1 to s 300 PC cannot be invoked where there has
been sufficient time after the provocation for passion to cool down
and for reason to regain dominion over the mind. The test is whether
a reasonable person in the same situation would have reacted to the
provocation as the accused did and would have been so much
provoked as to lose self-control and take the life of another person.
4
20. Holmes v Director of Public Prosecutions
• Facts: In this case, the wife give a statement of adultery before being
struck by her husband dead. There were no evidences to show her
statement was true.
• Held: The House dismissed the appeal to use exception 1 S 300. Mere
confession of adultery is not sufficient provocation to reduce killing
from murder to manslaughter.
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21. Director of Public Prosecututions v Camplin
• Lord Diplock laid down that to determine whether the act in question
was done under provocation or not is the test of a reasonable man; a
reasonable man is a person having the power of self-control to be
expected of an ordinary man of the sex and age of the accused.
• In the case, the boy struck the deceased with a chapati pan. It was
held that to taunt a person because of his race, physical infirmities or
some shameful incident in the past is offensive. That he was only 15
years of age at the time of the killing is the relevant characteristics of
the accused in the instant case. It is a characteristic which has its
effects on the temperament as well as physique. Appeal dismissed.
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24. What defines ‘simple hurt’?
• S 319 – Simple hurt is bodily pain, disease or infirmity.
3
25. What are the elements of voluntarily causing
hurt?
• S 321 – When the person has intention to cause hurt or the
knowledge that he is likely to cause hurt.
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26. What is the punishment for voluntarily causing
hurt?
• S 323 – The punishment is imprisonment up to 1 year or with a fine or
both.
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28. What are the kinds of hurt that fall under
‘grievous’?
• Emasculation.
• Permanent privation of the sight of either eye.
• Permanent privation of the hearing of either ear.
• Privation of any member or joint.
• Destruction of permanent impairing of the powers of any member or join.
• Permanent disfiguration of the head or face.
• Fracture or discolation of a bone or tooth.
• Any hurt which endangers life or which causes the sufferer to be during the
space of 10 days in severe bodily pain, or unable to follow his ordinary
pursuits.
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29. What are the elements of causing grievous
hurt?
• S 322 – When someone voluntarily causes grievous hurt or that he
knows to be likely to cause grievous hurt.
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30. What is the punishment for voluntarily causing
grievous hurt?
• S 325 – Imprisonment up to 7 years or fine or both.
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32. Is physical contact is a requirement for hurt to
be established?
• No.
• Jashanmal Jhamatmal v Brahmanand Sarupanand
Facts: The accused shouted ‘Haoo’ which caused the victim to suffer from
nervous shock and collapsed.
Held: Infirmity denotes an unsound mind or unhealthy state of the body or
mind and clearly a state of temporary mental impairement or hysteria or
terror would constitute infirmity, within the meaning of the expression in s
319 of PC. Therefore, the accused must be deemed to have intended to
cause hurt to the woman, and the question whether that hurt was simple
or grievous would depend on the medical evidence. Accused is convicted.
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33. If someone dies from being hurt would it be
culpable homicide?
• No.
• Marcelino Fernanded v State
Facts: Accused beat up the victim for selling a fake ring. They slapped, kicked and used a broken tile. The
victim died 3 hours later.
Held: Accused only convicted under hurt because; first, there is no clear evidence that the victim died due to
the beating and not the fall. Secondly, the accused and the victim do not have previous enmity and therefore
has no intention to cause death but only to punish the deceased. It was held that the accused be convicted
only for voluntarily causing hurt.
• Muhammad Rafi v Opposite Party
Facts: Accused stabbed the victim with a pen-knife due to a quarrel. The victim died 15 days later due to
septic poisoning from the wound.
Held: The accused is convicted for voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous instrument. This is because
from medical evidence – the wound from the pen-knife is not itself sufficient to cause death, because the
septic poisoning is also pressed by hands and bandaged with dirty cloth. Therefore, the accused’s act was
not likely to cause death. But since the wound is ‘dangerous to life’, it falls under ‘grievous’.
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34. • R v Clarence: It does not fall under the definition (maliciously wound
to inflict grievous bodily harm with any weapon or instrument).
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It is not ‘grievous hurt’ for a man to infect his wife
his disease through sexual intercourse that is
consented due to her ignorance
36. What is the definition for wrongful restraint?
• S 339 – Obstructing a person from moving from one place to another
where he has a right to proceed and wants to go. Exception is where
the person believes in a good faith that he has lawful right to
obstruct.
2
37. What is the punishment for wrongful
restraint?
• S 341 – Imprisonment up to 1 month or with a fine or both.
3
38. What is the definition for wrongful
confinement?
• It is a form of wrongful restraint under which a person is wrongfully
prevented from proceeding beyond certain circumscribed limits. For
example, arrest or locking up of a man in a room or tying him up to a
tree amounts to wrongful confinement.
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39. Is physical obstruction necessary?
• Physical obstruction is unnecessary.
• It is sufficient, if such an impression was produced on the mind of the
victim as to create a reasonable apprehension that he was not free to
depart and that he would be forthwith restrained, if he attempted to
do so.
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40. What is the punishment for wrongful
confinement?
• S 342 – Imprisonment up to 1 year or fine or both.
6
41. It is not limited to offences against public
servant but is a general section in the case of...
• Shyam Lal Sharma v State of Madhya Pradesh
7
