Darshan Singh v State of Punjab

Facts

A long-standing land dispute between two brothers' families (a panchayat had earlier allotted disputed well-land to the deceased Gurcharan Singh) erupted into violence on 15 July 1991. The accused Darshan Singh's father, Bakhtawar Singh, was struck on the head with a gandasa (machete) by Gurcharan Singh and his party. After his father fell injured, Darshan Singh fired his licensed 12-bore shotgun, fatally wounding Gurcharan Singh. The trial court acquitted the accused on the ground of private defence, but the Punjab & Haryana High Court reversed the acquittal and convicted him.

Issues

• Who was the aggressor in the incident?
• Whether the accused lawfully exercised the right of private defence, and whether that right extended to causing the death of the assailant?
• Whether the High Court was justified in reversing the trial court's acquittal?

Arguments

The prosecution contended that the accused party initiated the confrontation and that the firing was excessive and disproportionate retaliation. The defence argued that the deceased's party attacked first, striking the accused's father on the head with a gandasa, and that the accused fired only after his father fell injured, in lawful self-defence to avert a threat to life.

Held

The Supreme Court set aside the High Court's conviction and restored the trial court's acquittal. It held the trial court's view was sound and plausible: the head injury to the accused's father showed his party were the victims, and the absence of recovered pellets from the prosecution witnesses undermined their version. The Court emphasised that a mere reasonable apprehension of danger is enough to set the right of private defence in operation, and that a person cannot be expected to modulate his defence step by step with arithmetical exactitude. As the accused faced imminent and reasonable danger to life, his firing was justified even though it proved fatal, and the appellate court ought not to have reversed a plausible acquittal merely because the complainant's version seemed more credible.

Ratio decidendi

Where a person is suddenly confronted with a reasonable apprehension of imminent danger to life or body, the right of private defence arises and may extend to causing the death of the assailant; the defender need not weigh the force used with precision, need only establish the plea on a preponderance of probabilities, and may rely on it even without pleading it if it emerges from the record.

Significance

A leading authority that distils the law on the right of private defence into ten guiding principles, repeatedly cited and followed in later self-defence cases. Under the new code, the same right of private defence now sits in Sections 34-44 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (Section 38 BNS corresponding to old Section 100 IPC on when the right extends to causing death), which substantially re-enact the IPC provisions, so the principles in this judgment continue to govern.

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