There can be no compromise with a dead man: Punjab and Haryana High Court

Saurabh Malik

Chandigarh, April 4

There can be no compromise with a dead man, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has ruled, virtually putting a halt to the practice of quashing FIRs on the basis of conciliation between the parties in abetment to suicide cases.

The Bench made it clear that the abetment to suicide was an offence not just against the victim’s family. It was an offence against the sufferer as well, who was dead. As such the FIR could not be quashed on the basis of a compromise with just the aggrieved family of the deceased. The assertion came as Justice Gurvinder Singh Gill dismissed a petition filed by a wife for quashing an FIR for abetment to suicide after her husband ended his life.

Referring to the FIR registered in the matter, Justice Gill asserted that the court, after its perusal, found that the matter broadly pertained to abetment to suicide. The petitioner (wife) had allegedly levelled allegations against her husband regarding his illicit relationship with some woman and “used to quarrel repeatedly”. She left her matrimonial home and refused to return, following which the victim felt upset.

Justice Gill added that the offence under Section 306 of the IPC on abetment to suicide was alleged to have been committed. It was a heinous offence. The husband had committed suicide. As such, it was not just the husband’s family which would be aggrieved. “The offence is broadly committed against the deceased himself. There can be no compromise with the dead man. As such the FIR cannot be quashed on the basis of a compromise”. Regarding the petitioner’s contention of quashing of the FIR on merit, Justice Gill asserted that the court was of the opinion that alleged false accusations against the victim’s character of having illicit relations levelled by the wife herself and subsequent quarrels with him on the grounds would prima facie attract the offence of abetment to commit suicide.

“Even the relatives had played a part in the same inasmuch as they had also been troubling the deceased. There are sufficient allegations in the FIR to constitute the offences. No ground for quashing of FIR either on basis of a compromise or even on merit is made out. The petition is sans merit and the same is hereby dismissed,” Justice Gill concluded.