Section 306: How the law baffles cops probing cases of suicide

Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code, which penalizes abetment to suicide, is being misused, particularly in Mumbai, where police appear to invoke the section differently depending on the gender and status of the deceased and suspect. While they show leniency when the accused is a woman, they act with undue haste to book and arrest men, especially when the deceased is a woman. The stakes become higher when the victim is a female celebrity and a male is accused of abetment.

MUMBAI: Over a month after Khar police had registered a case of suicide of a 25-year-old man in February this year, his family members approached the police station with WhatsApp chats of the deceased showing discussions between him and his former girlfriend, which they believed led him to take the drastic step. The chats revealed that instead of counselling him or informing his family, she had made light of the situation.

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The family members lodged a complaint against her, but for the next couple of weeks cops tried to dissuade them from setting criminal laws in motion against deceased’s former girlfriend. “I was asked why I want to ruin the girl’s life. It wouldn’t bring my son back, the police told me,” said the mother of the deceased. She however remained resolute, an FIR was registered, and Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was invoked on the woman for abetting suicide of the young man.

Section 306 of the IPC, which penalises abetment to suicide, seems to be one of the most misused pieces of the penal law, especially in Mumbai, where the police appear to invoke the section differently depending on the gender and status of the deceased and suspect. While they show leniency when the accused is a woman, they act with undue haste to book and arrest men, especially when the deceased is a woman.

Sometimes, media frenzy leads police to lean on this legal provision to shift the narrative, as they did in the suicide case of IIT-Bombay student Darshan Solanki. Solanki’s batch mate Arman Khatri was arrested after a special investigation team (SIT) of Mumbai police found a suicide note in Solanki’s room naming Khatri. On Wednesday, a special court granted bail to Khatri, saying the four-word suicide note recovered by SIT was not enough to conclude that Khatri had abetted the suicide.

Section 306 of IPC was originally intended to curb the practice of Sati, but now-a-days it is being abused to appease public sentiments around suicide, said retired Justice Abhay Thipsay.

“Any offense consists of an act and intent. An external event or action of someone else who is leading their normal life cannot be interpreted as abetment to suicide. Unless the other person has aided by purchasing the means of the death or goaded someone in clear words to take the extreme step, section 306 of IPC cannot be invoked,” Justice Thipsay said.

A broken relationship, failing an exam, lenders asking someone to return their money or losing a job are not situations where it is appropriate to use it, he clarified.

IPS officer turned lawyer and social activist YP Singh concurred, and added, “Being a subjective law that can be interpreted differently by different people, it wreaks havoc when handled by people with little legal training. Many cops are not very well equipped in law to think objectively in such situations.”

Former Mumbai police commissioner MN Singh however disagreed, as he believes that there is no scope for subjectivity in the section. “Any unnatural death of a human being must be investigated thoroughly by the police. Our job is not to decide if anyone is responsible but to take all the statements of people close to a person and present facts,” he said.

It is only when a conspiracy or an act that can be traced back as the cause of someone’s suicide that another person can be called an abettor, said senior counsel, Advocate Girish Kulkarni. Kulkarni has come across cases where the investigating team often ponders if charges of culpable homicide or abetment to suicide should be invoked. “In such instances, they usually invoke the former. Sometimes this is in direct contrast to the facts of the case that have already been put on record,” he said, adding, exaggeration by people around the deceased or media pressure often leads to this law being invoked as well.

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What the law says

Section 306 of IPC lays down that if any person commits suicide, whoever abets the commission of such suicide, shall be punished with up to 10 years imprisonment, and shall also be liable to fine.

In such cases, there must be proof of direct or indirect act/s of incitement to the commission of suicide – if the person has been guilty of goading, urging, provoking or encouraging to commit the act. If the person who died by suicide had been hypersensitive and the action of accused is otherwise not ordinarily expected to induce a person to commit suicide, it may not be safe to hold the accused guilty of abetment of suicide.

If the accused plays an active role in tarnishing the self-esteem and self-respect of the victim, which eventually draws the victim to commit the act, the accused may be held guilty of abetment of suicide.