Merc hit-and-run case: Cops could have slapped harsher charges

It seems that Delhi Police itself were not willing to book the juvenile, who mowed down a business executive with his Mercedes in Civil Lines area, under the strong sections of Indian Penal Code (IPC). If they wished they could have slapped harsher charges on him and his father who manipulated police and gave false evidences.

Meanwhile, on Thursday, the social networking site Facebook was flooded with the CCTV footage of the accident in which it is clearly seen that Sidhartha Sharma was crossing the road and a speeding Mercedes hit him. Due to the impact he was flung several feet into the air and landed at least 15 metre away. 

When Millennium Post asked some reputed advocates that how Delhi Police could have made a stronger case against the juvenile driver, they all echoed the same tune that a case under Sections 301 and 304 of the IPC could have been slapped against him.

Section 301 IPC that is a culpable homicide by causing death says — If a person, by doing anything which he intends or knows to be likely to cause death, commits culpable homicide by causing the death of any person, whose death he neither intends nor knows himself to be likely to cause, the culpable homicide committed by the offender is of the description of which it would have been if he had caused the death of the person whose death he intended or knew himself to be likely to cause. Section 304 IPC that is the punishment for culpable homicide not amounting to murder. “If both these sections were added in the FIR in which the accused is only booked under Sections 279 and 304(A), the accused would have been behind the bars. As he is a juvenile, he could have been sent to Juvenile Justice Board for two to three years.”

Not only this but also his father who was only challaned Rs 1,000 and booked under Motor Vehicle Act could have been booked as a co-conspirator in the culpable homicide. Sections 120 A (criminal conspiracy) and Section 34 (Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the IPC could be slapped against Manoj Aggarwal —the juvenile’s father.

Shockingly, when Millennium Post asked the cops close to this investigation the reason for not adding these sections in the FIR, though there is a provision under the law, the cops became defensive and questioned the intention of media on hyping the case despite the fact that so many persons are getting killed in accidents.