Up To 10 Years In Jail & Fine In Hit & Run Cases If Victim Dies
By A Special Correspondent
First publised on 2023-12-25 03:01:47
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If one is involved in a road accident in which anyone is fatally injured, one should not run away without reporting the accident to the authorities. For, under the new penal law, Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (which replaces the Indian Penal Code), if one's crime is proved and the victim dies, one will spend up to 10 years in jail and will also be liable to pay a hefty fine.
This provision was not there in the now-scrapped IPC. In BNS, a distinction has been made between causing death through rash and negligent act not amounting to culpable homicide (which is punishable by up to 5-year jail term and fine) and causing death through rash and negligent driving not amounting to culpable homicide and escaping without reporting the incident to a police officer or magistrate immediately after the incident (which is punishable by up to 10-year jail term and fine).
Hit and run cases in India claim more than 50000 lives annually. It is a well known fact that most often, the difference between life and death of an accident victim is timely medical assistance. The person involved in the accident is often the best person to report the accident and call for help or take the victim to the nearest hospital. They can help save lives if they take appropriate action instead of running away and letting the victim die unattended. But people do not do so due to fear of punishment and legal harassment as also that of public lynching if they remain at the accident spot. They also have the false sense of security that they will not be caught if they flee.
In fact, legal experts have said that in the light of the fear of public lynching, rules must bring clarity on how an accused reports the incident and also avoids public wrath. Then there is also the fact that the person who causes the accident also suffers trauma which impairs cohesive thinking. In other words, they can be shell-shocked. Although there can be no excuse for escaping after an accident and letting a person, or persons, die on the road, the fear of public lynching and effects of trauma must be factored in before making the rules.
