Stunts on public roads amount to culpable homicide, not just negligence: HC

In a significant ruling aimed at applying brakes to dangerous stunts on public roads and steering clear of preventable tragedies, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has held that performing motor stunts in public spaces with modified vehicles, endangering lives, travels beyond mere rash and negligent driving.

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Driving home the importance of commuter safety, the court asserted that such acts would prima facie fall under culpable homicide if they resulted in death, or attempt to commit culpable homicide if no death occurs.

“When someone does stunts on a public road, endangering public safety, and when the motor sport is not being conducted with the knowledge of the traffic control authorities and ample time has been given to them to take preventive steps, the acts of public stunt, if lead to death, would fall in the definition of culpable homicide and if death is not caused then an attempt to cause culpable homicide. Such acts would not fall only under section 106 BNS (analogous to 304-A IPC) because of the requisite knowledge that such an act is likely to result into death or cause death,” Justice Anoop Chitkara asserted.

The court also made it clear that individuals engaging in such stunts were not ignorant of the life-threatening consequences of their actions. “There is no reason to believe they would be unaware of the consequences of motorsport with a modified vehicle on a public road, and such conduct would depict a callous and unconcerned attitude towards the pedestrians and another vehicle on the road where they were doing a motor stunt. On the face of it, such an act would not fall under rash and negligent driving, but prima facie amounts to culpable homicide,” Justice Chitkara asserted.

The observations came in a case where a rider sitting pillion on a bike died in an accident with a tractor, modified by fitting an extra turbo pump to increase the acceleration. Seeking anticipatory bail, the counsel for the petitioner-tractor driver argued the victim and his friend were doing stunts on a bike and had friendly relations. He further argued that it is not a case of culpable homicide.

Dismissing the petition, Justice Chitkara asserted a lenient view of such actions would make already unsafe roads even more perilous. “If a soft stand is taken towards such stunts, the roads, which are already unsafe, will become more unsafe for pedestrians and two-wheelers, which account for the maximum number of causalities for pedestrians and two-wheelers in road accidents in this region… The impact of crime would also not justify anticipatory bail,” the court asserted.