A 2-Judge Bench of the Supreme Court was called upon to decide: “Whether every allegation or accusation levelled, a reprimand or rebuke made, an insinuation or insult voiced or even continuous acts of ill-treatment, harassment and defamation; as alleged in this case, would lead to a charge of abetment, if the person at the receiving end commits suicide, is a vexed question the Courts are called upon to decide when a charge is raised under Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860” now s.108 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023.

A 7-time MP committed suicide in February 2021 leaving behind a suicide note which named persons in the administration and police, who according to him, conspired to defame, degrade and demean him so as to end his political career and bring down his social standing, thus driving him to suicide; which he proclaimed in his last note, was his only option. The accused, named in the suicide note, filed separate applications to quash the FIR, u/s.482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. The petitions were allowed by the Bombay High Court by a common order, against which the appeals were filed before the Supreme Court.

The Bench held that “…even if there is allegation of constant harassment, continued over a long period; to bring in the ingredients of Section 306 read with Section 107, still there has to be a proximate prior act to clearly find that the suicide was the direct consequence of such continuous harassment, the last proximate incident having finally driven the subject to the extreme act of taking one’s life… The real intention of the accused and whether he intended by his action to at least possibly drive the victim to suicide, is the sure test.”.

The Bench noted the complaints made, the statements recorded, the suicide note; over which there was a cloud, and the subsequent conduct of the police regarding the delay in registering a crime and the casual statements made in the FIR and dismissed the appeals holding that the allegations levelled were not the direct causation of the death.