Assigning heavy workload cannot be abetting suicide: SC
Dhananjay.Mahapatra@timesgroup.com
New Delhi: 27.06.2018
In a decision with important work place implications, Supreme Court has ruled that superiors cannot be held responsible of abetment if an employee, depressed because of a heavy workload at office, commits suicide.
The SC said a superior officer assigning a load of work to an employee could not be assumed to be of a criminal bent of mind who intends to harass an employee or force him to end his life. It rejected the high court argument that the officer is culpable even there is no direct abetment on the grounds that the conditions created can lead to unbearable mental tension.
One Kishor Parashar, working in the Aurangabad office of the deputy director of education in Maharashtra government, committed suicide on August 8 last year. His wife filed a complaint with the police accusing her husband’s superior officer of abetting the suicide.
She alleged that the superior officer used to assign a heavy workload to the deceased requiring him to work from 10 am till late evening. She said the senior called him for work at odd hours and even on holidays, stopped salary for a month and threatened to stop increment. She claimed that because of work pressure, her husband remained silent at home and the superior officer was responsible for his suicide.
After the Aurangabad police registered an FIR, the senior officer moved the Aurangabad bench of Bombay HC for quashing the FIR which he termed absurd. On January 23, the HC rejected the plea to quash the FIR.
The HC had said, “The facts indicate that there was no direct abetment and the applicants cannot have any intention that the deceased should commit suicide. Even when the accused persons have no such intention, if they create a situation causing tremendous mental tension so as to drive the person to commit suicide, they can be said to be instigating the accused to commit suicide.”
When the superior officer appealed before the SC through advocate Shankar Chillarge, the plea was opposed by Maharashtra government’s standing counsel Nishant Katneswarkar. A bench of Arun Mishra and U U Lalit found the HC’s logic in roping in the superior officer on the charge of abetting suicide untenable.
Justice Lalit, who authored the judgment, said, “It is true that if a situation is created deliberately so as to drive a person to commit suicide, there would be room for attracting Section 306 of IPC (abetment to suicide). However, the facts on record in the present case are completely inadequate and insufficient (to reach that conclusion).”
Appreciating the facts of the case, the SC said, “As a superior officer, if some work was assigned by the applicant to the deceased, merely on that count it cannot be said that there was any guilty mind or criminal intent.”
Meeting the accusation of the wife that her husband was depressed because of stoppage of one month’s salary and threat to hold back increment, the bench said, “The exigencies of work and the situation may call for certain action on the part of superior, including stoppage of salary of a junior officer for a month. That action alone cannot be a pointer against such superior officer.” It quashed the FIR against the superior officer.
Dhananjay.Mahapatra@timesgroup.com
New Delhi: 27.06.2018
In a decision with important work place implications, Supreme Court has ruled that superiors cannot be held responsible of abetment if an employee, depressed because of a heavy workload at office, commits suicide.
The SC said a superior officer assigning a load of work to an employee could not be assumed to be of a criminal bent of mind who intends to harass an employee or force him to end his life. It rejected the high court argument that the officer is culpable even there is no direct abetment on the grounds that the conditions created can lead to unbearable mental tension.
One Kishor Parashar, working in the Aurangabad office of the deputy director of education in Maharashtra government, committed suicide on August 8 last year. His wife filed a complaint with the police accusing her husband’s superior officer of abetting the suicide.
She alleged that the superior officer used to assign a heavy workload to the deceased requiring him to work from 10 am till late evening. She said the senior called him for work at odd hours and even on holidays, stopped salary for a month and threatened to stop increment. She claimed that because of work pressure, her husband remained silent at home and the superior officer was responsible for his suicide.
After the Aurangabad police registered an FIR, the senior officer moved the Aurangabad bench of Bombay HC for quashing the FIR which he termed absurd. On January 23, the HC rejected the plea to quash the FIR.
The HC had said, “The facts indicate that there was no direct abetment and the applicants cannot have any intention that the deceased should commit suicide. Even when the accused persons have no such intention, if they create a situation causing tremendous mental tension so as to drive the person to commit suicide, they can be said to be instigating the accused to commit suicide.”
When the superior officer appealed before the SC through advocate Shankar Chillarge, the plea was opposed by Maharashtra government’s standing counsel Nishant Katneswarkar. A bench of Arun Mishra and U U Lalit found the HC’s logic in roping in the superior officer on the charge of abetting suicide untenable.
Justice Lalit, who authored the judgment, said, “It is true that if a situation is created deliberately so as to drive a person to commit suicide, there would be room for attracting Section 306 of IPC (abetment to suicide). However, the facts on record in the present case are completely inadequate and insufficient (to reach that conclusion).”
Appreciating the facts of the case, the SC said, “As a superior officer, if some work was assigned by the applicant to the deceased, merely on that count it cannot be said that there was any guilty mind or criminal intent.”
Meeting the accusation of the wife that her husband was depressed because of stoppage of one month’s salary and threat to hold back increment, the bench said, “The exigencies of work and the situation may call for certain action on the part of superior, including stoppage of salary of a junior officer for a month. That action alone cannot be a pointer against such superior officer.” It quashed the FIR against the superior officer.
No comments:
Post a Comment