Circumstances under which mistake of facts could be pleaded as a good defence under indian penal code

 

CIRCUMSTANCES UNDER WHICH MISTAKE OF FACT COULD BE PLEADED AS A GOOD DEFENCE UNDER INDIAN PENAL CODE.

 

“Mistake” is not mere forgetfulness. It is a slip”made not by design, but by mischance”. Under sec. 76 and 79 of IPC a mistake must be one of fact and not of law. At common law an honest and reasonable belief in the existence of circumstances, which, if true, would make the act for which a prisoner is indicted an innocent act has always been held to be a good defence. Honest and reasonable mistake stands in fact on the same footing as absence of the reasoning faculty, as in infancy, or perversion of that faculty, as in lunacy. It may be laid down as a general rule that an alleged offender is deemed to have acted under that state of facts which he is in good faith and on reasonable grounds believed to exist when he did the act alleged to be an offence. Ignorantia facti doth excuse, for such an ignorance many times makes the act itself morally involuntary. Where a man made a trust with a sword at a place where, upon reasonable grounds, he supposed a burglar to be, and killed a person who was not a burglar, it was held that he had committed no offence.

In other words, he was in the same situation as far as regards the homicide as if he had killed a burglar. The accused while guarding his maize field shot an arrow at a moving object in the bona fide belief that it was a bear and in the process caused the death of a man who was hiding there. It was held that he could notbe held liable for murder as his case was fully covered by s.79 as well as S.80 IPC. Similarly, where the accused while helping the police stopped a cart, which they in good faith believed to be carrying smuggled rice but ultimately their suspicion proved to be incorrect. It was held that they could not be prosecuted for wrongful restraint under sec. 341 as their case was covered by sec.79 IPC. Section 79 makes an offence a non-offence. Thus where the board of censors, acting within their jurisdiction and on a application made and pursued in good faith sanctions the public exhibition of a film, the producer and the connected agencies do enter the statutory harbour and are protected from prosecution under sec 292 IPC because s.79 of the code exonerates them at least in view of their bona fide belief that the certificate is justificatory. Similarly, as cross and jones observe that on a charge of murder by shooting under the English law, however weak the prisoner’s evidence that he believed the gun to be unloaded may be, the jury must acquit him of murder if they were not sure that he knew it was loaded for in that case the prosecution will have failed to prove the necessary mens rea to constitute the offence of murder. But where an act is clearly a wrong in itself, and a person, under a mistaken impression as to facts which render it criminal, commits the act, then according to the ratio decidendi in prince’s case he will be guilty of a criminal offence.