Senior’s admonition at workplace doesn’t amount to ‘intentional insult’, not crime: SC

Holding that senior’s admonition at the workplace does not amount to an “intentional insult” requiring criminal proceedings, the Supreme Court has said that allowing criminal charges to be pressed against individuals in such cases may lead to disastrous consequences, crippling the entire disciplinary atmosphere required in the workplace.

Mere abuse, discourtesy, rudeness or insolence do not amount to an intentional insult within the meaning of Section 504 of the Indian Penal Code (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace), a Bench of Justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Sandeep Mehta said in its February 10 judgment.

Section 504, which prescribed a jail term of up to two years, has been replaced with Section 352 under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) effective from July 2024.

The Bench quashed a 2022 criminal case against the officiating director of the National Institute for Empowerment of Persons with Intellectual Disabilities—accused of insulting an assistant professor who alleged that the director scolded and reprimand her in front of other employees for submitting complaints against him to the higher authorities.

The director failed to provide and maintain adequate PPE kits in the institute, which posed a great risk of spreading infectious diseases such as Covid-19, she had alleged.

However, the top court noted that from the bare perusal of the chargesheet and documents relied therein, the allegations seem to be purely conjectural, and by no stretch of imagination they can be considered sufficient to constitute the ingredients of the offences under Sections 269 (negligent acts that could spread a dangerous disease) and 270 (malicious act of spreading a life-threatening disease) of the IPC.

“Therefore, in our opinion, senior’s admonition cannot be reasonably attributed to mean an ‘intentional insult with the intent to provoke’ within the means of Section 504, IPC, provided that the admonition relates to the matters incidental to the workplace covering discipline and the discharge of duties therein,” the top court said.

“It is a reasonable expectation on the part of a person who caters to the affairs at the helm that his juniors should attend to their professional duties with utmost sincerity and dedication,” it said.