Patient With 92% Burn Injuries Can Give Dying Declaration
Patient With 92% Burn Injuries Can Give Dying Declaration
BY- BHAGYASHIKHA SAPTARSHI
BACKGROUND
A dying
declaration is a statement made by a declarant, who is unavailable to testify
in court (typically because of the declarant's death), who made the statement
under a belief of certain or impending death. The statement must also relate to
what the declarant believed to be the cause or circumstances of the declarant's
impending death. In medieval English courts, the principle originated of Nemo
moriturus praesumitur mentiri — "No-one on the point of
death should be presumed to be lying". An incident in which a dying
declaration was admitted as evidence has been found in a 1202 case.
CURRENT ISSUE
The Supreme Court in a Special Leave Petition (criminal) filed in the case of Bhagwan v State of Maharashtra under criminal appellate jurisdiction has dismissed an appeal by a murder convict by upholding the dying declaration given by his deceased wife. On 19/04/1999 at about midnight he came to the house in a drunken position and beat his wife and set her on fire in which his two sons also got burn injuries.
The appellant challenged the Judgment of Bombay High Court where he had been convicted under Section 302 of IPC for murdering his wife by setting her on fire after pouring kerosene on her. Here the appellant was a husband who is accused to have ill-treated his wife in the influence of drinking liquor and under section 326 IPC for voluntarily causing burn injuries to his sons was framed. The deceased wife was taken to the hospital along with her sons but she succumbed to death. The court rejected the arguments raised by the appellant. It was held that the court could not take the hyper-technical view in differentiating between ‘consciousness' and ‘fit state of mind'. The bench referred the case to the Constitution bench decision of the SC in Laxman v State of Maharashtra, 2002 (6) SCC 710 where it was held that dying declaration should not be discarded for the mere reason that all that is certified that she was physically and mentally fit. The question that whether a person having 92% burn injury can give a dying declaration is also no longer Res Integra as in the case of Vijay Pal v State (Government of NCT of Delhi), 2015 (4) SCC 749 the honorable court observed that the patient suffered 92% Burn Injuries as in the case would not stand in the way of patient giving Dying Declaration which otherwise inspires the confidence of the Court and is free from tutoring, and can be found reliable. The other contentions taken by the appellant were also turned down by the Court which proceeded to dismiss the appeal and uphold the conviction of the appellant.
CONCLUSION
The bench comprising Justice K.M. Joseph and Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul had dismissed the appeal of the husband and since the appellant had been released on bail, the Court directed that he had been taken into custody to serve the remaining sentence. Also Justice K.M. Joseph stated that "the unambiguous words from the mouth of a deceased wife who cannot be expected to lie as she would be conscious, that she would have to meet her maker with a lie in her mouth." And hence it can be said that due to the mere fact that a person having 92% Burn Injuries can be conscious and not in a fit state of mind to give a Dying Declaration.
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