Relationship break-up, blocked calls do not amount to abetment: Rajasthan High Court

The Rajasthan High Court has held that merely ending a relationship and blocking a partner's phone number does not, by itself, amount to abetment of suicide. The observation came from a bench of Justice Farjand Ali on September 25 while hearing a bail petition filed by a 37-year-old man from Jaipur, an accused in a suicide case who was lodged in Jaipur Central Jail.

According to the case details, the accused had been in a relationship with the woman, but communication between them had largely stopped after he blocked her telephone numbers. The woman was said to be aggrieved by his association with another woman. Shortly before her death, she recorded several videos naming the man and holding him responsible for her actions.

Without expressing any final view on the truthfulness, admissibility or evidentiary value of the allegations, the court observed that the immediate emotional narrative emerging from the material appeared to be centred on the deceased's sense of rejection and abandonment, and her inability to come to terms with the end of the relationship and the accused's association with another woman.

Referring to Section 108 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which deals with abetment of suicide, Justice Ali said the mere fact that a person has died by suicide and that the accused was in some way connected with the deceased, or that the deceased held grievances against him, does not by itself complete the legal ingredients of abetment. The foundational requirement, the court said, is an act amounting to abetment, which brings in the concepts of instigation, intentional aiding and the requisite guilty mind.

The High Court noted that the Supreme Court has consistently held that the prosecution must disclose a positive, active and proximate act of instigation or intentional aid, and that such conduct must have the necessary nexus with the act of suicide. The element of mens rea cannot be presumed merely from the unfortunate consequence of the deceased's act; it has to emerge from the conduct attributed to the accused, the court said.

In the present case, the court added, the material collected during investigation did not at this stage disclose with sufficient clarity any particular contemporaneous act by the accused immediately preceding the occurrence by which he expressly or otherwise intentionally provoked, incited or aided the deceased to commit suicide.

The bench further observed that people respond differently to rejection, separation, jealousy and the end of relationships. While such experiences may cause intense emotional distress, emotional suffering by itself does not constitute a criminal offence, it said. The court must therefore distinguish between understanding the psychological reasons behind a person's actions and establishing legal criminal responsibility for those actions.

Without recording any final opinion on the merits of the prosecution case, and keeping in view the nature of the allegations, the material presently available, the legal distinction between emotional causation and statutory abetment, the stage of the proceedings and the fact that appreciation of evidence is ultimately a matter for trial, the court found that a prima facie case warranting continued incarceration was not sufficiently made out for the purpose of deciding the bail application.

The court also noted a high probability that the trial may take considerable time to conclude, and allowed the man's bail subject to a personal bond of Rs 50,000 with two sureties of Rs 25,000 each.

Advocate Vibhuti Bhushan Sharma, appearing for the accused, argued that no case for the alleged offences was made out against the man and that his incarceration was not warranted. He further submitted that the man had been made an accused based on conjectures and surmises.