- Punishment for culpable homicide not amounting to murder —
Whoever commits culpable homicide not amounting to murder shall be punished with imprisonment for life, or imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine, if the act by which the death is caused is done with the intention of causing death, or of causing such bodily injury as is likely to cause death, or with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years, or with fine, or with both, if the act is done with the knowledge that it is likely to cause death, but without any intention to cause death, or to cause such bodily injury as is likely to cause death.
CLASSIFICATION OF OFFENCE
Para I: Punishment—Imprisonment for life, or imprisonment for 10 years and fine—Cognizable—Non-bailable—Triable by Court of Session—Noncompoundable.
Para II: Punishment—Imprisonment for 10 years, or fine, or both—Cognizable— Non-bailable—Triable by Court of Session—Non-compoundable.
COMMENTS
(i) Before an accused is held guilty and punished under first part or second part of section 304 a death must have been caused by the assailant under any of the circumstances mentioned in the five exceptions to section 300; Harendra Nath Mandal v. State of Bihar, 1993(1) Crimes 984 (SC).
(ii) Out of the three accused persons, one of the accused person gave a fatal blow on the head of the deceased, the other accused person injured the deceased by spear on his knee and arm. First accused person is liable to be convicted under part I of section 304. The other accused person is liable to be convicted under section 324 as section 34 has not been applied after setting aside conviction under section 147 of the Indian Penal Code; Kedar Prasad v. State of Madhya Pradesh, AIR 1992 SC 1629.
(iii) Where there was absence of prior enmity with deceased and intention accused was sentenced under section 304, part II and not under section 302; Rajju v. State of Uttar Pradesh, (1994) Cr LJ 105 (All).
(iv) Whether the plea of drunkenness can be taken as defence for claiming acquittal or for lessening sentence depends upon ‘intention’ and ‘knowledge’ of the accused; Mirza Ghani Baig v. State of Andhra Pradesh, (1997) 2 Crimes 19 (AP).