“Act of a person of unsound mind- nothing is an offence which is done by a person

who, at the time of doing it, by reason of unsoundness of mind, is incapable of

knowing the nature of the act, or that he is doing what is either wrong or contrary
to law.”[i]

In order to take the defence under this section it is not merely enough to simply
take the plea of insanity, rather, based on the facts and circumstances of the
case, the thing which is to be proved in front of the court of law is that the
person who committed the offence, was suffering from unsoundness of mind at the
time of the commission of the offence and was relatively not in a position to judge
the nature and consequences of the act at that particular juncture of time.

is the fact that the terms unsoundness of mind and insanity are the terms used for
referring to the same concept. The only difference between the two terms is that
the phrase ‘Unsoundness of mind’ is used in Indian law while the term insanity is
used in the English law.

A major point to be noted here is that the drafters of the Indian Penal Code 1860
chose the expression ‘Insanity of Mind’ in Place of the expression ‘insanity’ with
an objective to widen the horizons of the provision as the term insanity of mind
includes a lot wider perspective.

The legal maxim “Non compos mentis” is often used to address the person with a
unsound state of mind. The maxim means ‘not of sound mind.’ Further, the
unsoundness of mind can be of two types in terms of nature:

Permanent unsoundness of mind (In the situation of permanent unsoundness of mind, a

person is deprived of his thinking abilities and mental faculty permanently due to
any psychological or mental problem)
Temporary unsoundness of mind (in the situation of temporary unsoundness of mind, a
person is temporarily in the state of loss of his motor skills and thinking
capacity. This type of unsoundness of mind can be due to a number of reasons
ranging from intoxication, intake of drugs etc.)
Essentials of section 84 of IPC:
The act should be done by an individual of unsound mind
Such individual should be impotent of judging and knowing:
The exact nature of the act done by him, or
The act committed by him is inconsistent with the law of the land, or
The act done by him was wrong
The impotency thus caused to the individual should be due to the exclusive reason
of unsoundness of Mind.
The impotency mentioned above in Paras2 must exist at the time of doing the act
constituting an offence.
In order to successfully plead the defence of ‘unsoundness of mind’, the essentials
are required to be proved before the court of law beyond a reasonable doubt.

MCNAUGHTON RULE AND THE ORIGIN OF SECTION 84 OF THE INDIAN PENEL CODE, 1860
An important point which is very significant to be known is that the provision of
‘unsoundness of mind’ under Indian law has it origin from the McNaughton Rule under
the English Law as established in a decision of the House of Lords in the case of
R v Daniel McNaughton by the judiciary of England.[ii] It should also be taken a
note of that the McNaughton rules is also one of the important test to determine
insanity along with few other tests.

In that case, in regards to the protection of insanity, the House of Lords devised
the controversial McNaughton Rules based on the five questions which had been
submitted to them. The connection came to be made in a case where McNaughton was
charged with the murder by shooting Edward Drummond, who was England’s then-Prime
Minister Sir Robert Peel’s Pvt Secretary. The accused McNaughton provided medical
evidence to show he was not in a sound state of mind at the time of committing the
act. He said he had an irrational delusion that the Prime Minister was the only
cause behind all of his problems. He had also said he mistook Drummond for the
prime minister as a result of the mad delusion and attempted his assassination by
shooting him. The plea of insanity was admitted, and on the ground of insanity
McNaughton was found not guilty.

The aforementioned decision was the focus of controversy in the House of Lords. It
was then decided to take the opinions of all the judges on the rules concerning
such cases. Five questions were then presented to the Lords of Justice. A review of
the responses to questions 2 and 3 and the conditions of section 84 of the IPC,
1860 would clearly indicate that the section was modelled on that answers.[iii]

LEGAL INSANITY vis-à-vis MEDICAL INSANITY

There needs to be a difference between legal insanity and medical insanity. A Court
is only concerned with legal insanity, and not medical insanity. What is given by
Section 84, IPC, 1860 is the defence of legal insanity as distinct from medical
insanity. An individual becomes lawfully insane when he or she is unable to
recognize the meaning of the act or that what he did was wrong, or against the
law[iv]. Individual incapacity on the definition of insanity must be of the sort
attracting the application of section 84, IPC, 1860.[v]

An individual who claims exoneration under section 84 of the IPC, 1860 from
responsibility for an offense has to prove civil insanity and not mental insanity.
The IPC, 1860 did not describe the term “unsoundness of mind” and it was primarily
regarded as being similar to insanity. But in various ways the word insane has
different meanings and reflects differing degrees of psychiatric illness. Any
individual who has mental disorder is not ipso facto excluded from criminal
liability. The very reality that the accused is conceited, strange, irascible and
his brain is not quite perfect, or that the physical and emotional disorders he has
undergone have left his mind poor and have impaired his feelings or indulgences in
other peculiar acts, or had fits of insanity at short intervals, or that he has
been exposed to epileptic changes and erratic behaviour, or that the action is
whimsical to attract the application of section 84 of the IPC, 1860.[vi]

No doubt the medical profession will view the accused as a mentally ill person.
However, in order to assert the privilege of defending insanity in court, the
defendant would have to show that at the time the crime was committed his cognitive
skills were so affected that he did not realize the essence of the act.[vii]
Section 84 of IPC, 1860 contemplates only civil insanity.[viii]

INDIAN CASE LAWS

Ratan Lal v. State of Madhya Pradesh:
The accused was in the habit of setting fire to his own clothes and house. It was
held that this could hardly be called rational and was more likely verging on
insanity. The Supreme Court accepted the plea of insanity raised by the accused and
absolved him of criminal liability.[ix]

Bhikari v. State of Uttar Pradesh

The accused was working in the field. A few months before the occurrence, he had
threatened to kill all the family members of the deceased. Further, on the date of
the event, though there were other people around, he carefully chose only the
children of the deceased’s family. All this indicated that his act ions were
deliberate, pre meditated and not acts of an insane man.[x]

SK Nair v. State of Punjab:

The accused tried to assault a person with a dagger. The deceased caught hold of
him and said that the matter will be reported to the superiors. The accused
retorted to the deceased with the words ‘only if you were still alive’ and
inflicted a blow with a khukri on the deceased and killed him. The defence of the
accused was that he suffered from paranoia. A paranoid is not only a person of
unsound mind, but also suffers from special and peculiar ideas and visions, which
are different from other persons of unsound mind. A paranoid within moments may
behave wildly and then be normal again. The threat meted out by the accused to the
deceased showed that at the time of the commission of the crime, the accused did
not lose his sense of understanding. He was, therefore, convicted under s 302 and
sentenced to life imprisonment.[xi]

State of Orissa v. Kalia Alias Debabrata Maharana:

The accused murdered three people and wounded others, although no prior enmity or
motive had been identified. The witnesses said he fled from one location to
another, and on his way, he indiscriminately attacked five people without any
excuse or rhyme. The proof suggests that the appellant had long developed insanity
and had the right to the protection of this section.[xii]

42ND REPORT OF LAW COMMISSION OF INDIA

In view of the critique of the McNaughton Laws in various countries like Britain,
the Law Commission of India revisited section 84 of the IPC, 1860, but came to the
conclusion that the statute of insanity according to section 84 of the IPC, 1860,
does not require any reform in Indian circumstances.[xiii]

Section 84 prescribes the substantive standard of liability in cases of suspected

mental insanity. The Penal Code does not have a definition of “unsoundness of
mind.” However, this term was primarily viewed as comparable to insanity by the
Courts. But no clear meaning of the word “insanity” itself. It is a term used to
describe mental disorder in varying degrees. And a mentally ill person is not ipso
facto excluded from criminal liability. A distinction is to be made between legal
insanity and medical insanity. A Court is concerned with legal insanity, and not
with medical insanity.[xiv] In this case, the accused was being treated immediately
before the incident. Proof to show that he stayed mentally fit following treatment
for around four years. He was also sent for treatment after the trial and his
behaviour was normal afterwards. On these grounds the accused was found not
entitled to immunity under section 84. The Court also added that when previous
evidence of the accused’s insanity comes to light during the trial, the accused
must be medically tested and brought before the Court. Any mistake in this regard
in the criminal case will establish infirmity and the accused would be entitled to
the benefit of doubt.

‘At the time of doing it’– It must be clearly seen that at the time the act was
committed, the accused party laboured under such a deficiency of thought, from a
mental illness, as not understanding the essence and significance of the act he was
doing or, whether he knew it, not realizing he was doing what was wrong.[xv] He is
liable if he did know it.[xvi]

In Sheralli Wali Mohammed v State of Maharashtra,[xvii]it was held that:

… it must be proved clearly that, at the time of the commission of the acts, the
appellant, by

reason of unsoundness of mind, was incapable of either knowing the nature of the
act or

that the acts were either morally wrong or contrary to law. The question to be
asked is, is

there evidence to show that, at the time of the commission of the offence, he was
labouring
under any such incapacity? On this question, the state of his mind before and after
the

commission of the offence is relevant.

The critical moment to decide whether or not to offer the advantage of this section
is the actual period that the offence takes place. If, at that moment, a man is
found to operate under such a defect of conscience as not to realize the essence of
the act he was doing or that, even though he knew it, he did not know whether it
was either incorrect or contrary to the law, then this section must be used. The
specific circumstances, such as the actions of the accused before the execution of
the offence and his conduct after the commission of the offence, should be taken
into account in coming to that conclusion.[xviii]

The accused forced a four-year-old boy into fire leading to his death but there was
nothing to prove that there was any deliberation or preparedness to commit the
murder. His deed was followed by manifestations of unnatural brutality and freely
performed. He neither covered up, nor backed away, nor attempted to escape
observation that showed that he was not aware of his guilt. It was held that the
accused had the right to benefit from section 84 and that his conviction was set
aside under section 302[xix]. The victim, a young boy born by his parents, was
moving abroad for further studies. When going abroad his parents did not want to
see him. Much later the death of his parents was revealed to him. On his return to
India, he unexpectedly committed violent offences. He proceeded and completed his
engineering course again during the pendency of the session’s case and started a
printing press and later operated a garage and allied industries employing nearly
30 men. Before and after the crimes, his conduct was that of a reasonable man. It
was held that at the time of the offence he was insane and sought section 84’s
defence.[xx] Where the accused was examined by two doctors who declared him to be
schizophrenic and where his abnormal conduct was also evident from the reported
evidence, the Supreme Court held that the acquittal of the accused by the High
Court was acceptable.[xxi]

In other words , in order to gain the protection of section 84 IPC, 1860, it must
be shown that, at the time of the commission of the act, the accused was unable to
either recognize the meaning of the act or whether the act was either morally
incorrect or contrary to the law, and it is most important to assess his state of
mind before and after the execution of the offence. Admitting the defence of
insanity on claims deriving solely from the character of the crime would be
dangerous.[xxii] Therefore the fact that the accused committed the murder over a
trifling matter and made his crime a clean breast does not go to prove that he was
insane.[xxiii]

Apart from the McNaughton Rule there are basically 4 more established tests under
the English law which have also been pleaded before the Indian courts to determine
insanity of an individual in Indian context as well.

WILD BEAST TEST

One of the important tests to determine insanity under common law is the WILD BEAST
TEST. This test was laid down or propounded in the landmark case of R v.
Arnold[xxiv] where the defendant was accused of an attempt over lord Onslow. An
important point to be taken into consideration here is that all the proofs and
evidences were against the accused in the mentioned case but was still acquitted
and Tracy J. laid down the principle as follows “ if someone is under the
visitation of God and could not distinguish between good and evil, and he did not
know what he did , though he committed the greatest offence , yet he could not be
guilty of any offence, against any law whatsoever.”[xxv]

The same test was ratified in Lord FERRER’S CASE[xxvi], this case is related to the
acquittal of an accused named Earl Ferrers who was tried in front of the House of
Lords for murdering his steward. He pleaded the defence of Insanity successfully.

INSANE DELUSION TEST

The Hadfield case[xxvii]played a significant role in laying down the foundation of
one of the most significant tests to determine and examine the insanity of an
individual. In this type of situation, the person loses his mental faculty either
permanently or temporarily and the person suffers from delusion, so high that they
over shadow the state of faculties of the victims thus involved.

IRRESISTIBLE IMPULSE
A criminal’s mere abnormality of mind or partial illusion, overwhelming compulsion
or compulsive conduct provides no protection under section 84 as the law found in
that section is still squarely focused on the obsolete 19th-century McNaughton
Laws. In fact, the rules of section 84 are the same as those set out in the Judges’
answers to the questions put to them by the House of Lords, in the case of
McNaughton. Behaviour, history, predecessor, and subsequent to the incident can be
important in determining the accused’s mental state at the time of the case, but
not that remote in time.[xxviii]

Similarly, in Kalicharan[xxix], it has been pointed out that mere absence of motive
for a crime, howsoever atrocious it may be, in the plea and proof of legal Insanity
being the case within the ambit of this section. The main fact that the murder is
committed by the accused on a sudden impulse and there is no discoverable motive
for the act can form no bases of accepting the plea of insanity[xxx]

DURHAM RULE
The case of Durham v. United States[xxxi] held all the other prevalent tests to
determine insanity as obsolete and suggested that all the other tests should be
suspended and thus the circuit courts propounded a new rule known as the Durham
rule to determine insanity. This rule can be one of the aptest tests regarding the
test of insanity as this rule takes into account the causal connection between the
act committed and the mental state of mind of the accused and this approach is a
practical approach and it outrightly rejects the involvement of any unnatural
element as a factor of causing insanity.

CONCLUSION
It can be clearly drawn from the article that the McNaughton Rule form the base of
the law related to the criminal liability of a person of unsound mind in India.
This article gives a contrasting account of the law relating to insanity (as
referred in UK) and the law of unsoundness of mind (as referred under Indian law).
Best possible have been put in to make an in-depth analysis along with various case
laws and authorities to support the claim. It can further be said that it is the
duty of the law commission of India to take active action with regard to reforming
the provision. The law of unsoundness of mind or in other words, Section 84 of
Indian Penal code needs or requires to be re visited in order to fix the loop holes
in the law as per the changing time and needs of the society in order to prevent
its misuse.