Inquest under the BNSS 2023 Sections 194 to 196

Section 194(1), BNSS 2023

When the officer in charge of a police station or some other police officer specially empowered by the State Government in that behalf receives information that a person has committed suicide, or has been killed by another, or by an animal, or by machinery, or by an accident, or has died under circumstances raising a reasonable suspicion that some other person has committed an offence, he shall immediately give intimation thereof to the nearest Executive Magistrate empowered to hold inquests, and, unless otherwise directed by any rule prescribed by the State Government, or by any general or special order of the District or Sub-divisional Magistrate, shall proceed to the place where the body of such deceased person is, and there, in the presence of two or more respectable inhabitants of the neighbourhood, shall make an investigation, and draw up a report of the apparent cause of death, describing such wounds, fractures, bruises and other marks of injury as may be found on the body, and stating in what manner, or by what weapon or instrument, such marks appear to have been inflicted.

📖 George v. State of Kerala, (1998) 4 SCC 605

Facts: A conviction was challenged on the ground that the inquest report prepared under section 174 of the Code of Criminal Procedure did not contain the names of the assailants, did not describe the occurrence as the witnesses afterwards deposed to it, and did not record the presence of the eyewitnesses, and that those omissions showed the prosecution case to be a later fabrication.

Held: The Supreme Court rejected the contention and restated the scope of the proceeding. The object of an inquest is to ascertain whether a person died under suspicious circumstances or an unnatural death and, if so, what the apparent cause of death is. The question whether the death was caused by an offence, who caused it, in what manner, with what intention and by whom, is foreign to the ambit and scope of the proceeding. The inquest report is therefore not required to contain the names of the accused, the names of the eyewitnesses, or the manner in which the occurrence took place, and the absence of such particulars is not a defect and cannot be used to discredit the prosecution case. The Court held that the statement of a witness recorded in the course of an inquest is a statement made in the course of an investigation and is subject to the ordinary restrictions on the use of such statements.

Ratio: An inquest is confined to the apparent cause of death. The names of the assailants, of the eyewitnesses, and the manner of the occurrence fall outside its scope, and their absence from the report is not a defect.

📖 Radha Mohan Singh v. State of Uttar Pradesh, (2006) 2 SCC 450

Facts: Discrepancies were pointed out between the inquest report and the evidence at trial, and it was argued that the inquest report should be treated as a contemporaneous document contradicting the prosecution version, and that its contents were evidence of the facts stated in it.

Held: The Court held that an inquest report is not substantive evidence and cannot be treated as evidence of the truth of what it states. It is prepared for the limited statutory purpose of recording the apparent cause of death, and its evidentiary value is confined to that. Discrepancies between the inquest report and the evidence at trial in relation to matters outside the scope of the inquest are of no consequence, because the report was never required to deal with them. The Court also held that the officer who prepared it may be examined and the report used in the ordinary way in relation to what it does record, but that the document does not become proof of the cause of death, which is a matter for the medical evidence.

Ratio: An inquest report is not substantive evidence. Its value is confined to the limited statutory purpose for which it is prepared, and discrepancies on matters outside that purpose are immaterial.

⚠ What an inquest report is, and what it is not

It is not evidence of the cause of death. That is a matter for the medical evidence of the person who conducted the post-mortem. The inquest records the apparent cause, on a view of the body by a police officer.

It is not a record of the prosecution case. It is not required to name the accused or the eyewitnesses, or to describe the occurrence, and it is not an infirmity that it does none of those things.

Statements recorded during it are police statements. A statement made to the officer in the course of an inquest is a statement in the course of an investigation, governed by section 181: not signed, and usable only to contradict its maker.

What it is useful for is the description of the injuries on the body and the time at which the body was examined. Those are within its scope, and a discrepancy there is a real one.

⚠ The seven-year rule, and the single exception

Four of the six occasions concern the death of a woman within seven years of her marriage. The pattern is deliberate and matches the treatment of the subject in the penal law and in the law of evidence, where the same period marks the presumption relating to dowry death.

The practical effect is that in such a case the officer has no discretion at all. A death within seven years of marriage in suspicious circumstances, or where a relative asks, or which is said to be a dowry death, goes for post-mortem whatever the officer thinks of the apparent cause. The provision exists because the cases in which a post-mortem was most needed were precisely the cases in which it was least likely to be ordered.

The single exception is where the state of the weather and the distance make it impossible to forward the body without risk of such putrefaction on the road as would render the examination useless. It is narrow, the reasons must appear on the record, and it is not a general discretion to dispense with the examination.

Section 196, BNSS 2023

(1) When the case is of the nature referred to in clause (i) or clause (ii) of the proviso to sub-section (3) of section 194, the nearest Magistrate empowered to hold inquests shall, and in any other case mentioned in sub-section (1) of section 194, any Magistrate so empowered may hold an inquiry into the cause of death either instead of, or in addition to, the investigation held by the police officer; and if he does so, he shall have all the powers in conducting it which he would have in holding an inquiry into an offence.

(2) Where the Magistrate considers it expedient to make an examination of the dead body of any person who has been already interred, in order to discover the cause of his death, the Magistrate may cause the body to be disinterred and examined.

(3) Where a person dies or disappears, or rape is alleged to have been committed on any woman, while such person or woman is in the custody of the police or in any other custody authorised by the Magistrate or the Court, under this Sanhita in addition to the inquiry or investigation held under this Sanhita, an inquiry shall be held by the Judicial Magistrate or the Metropolitan Magistrate, as the case may be, within whose local jurisdiction the offence has been committed.

The position stated shortly

1. An inquest is an inquiry into the apparent cause of death. Who caused the death, in what manner and with what intention are foreign to its scope: George v. State of Kerala.

2. Section 194(1) applies on information of a suicide, a killing by another, by an animal, by machinery or by accident, or a death in circumstances raising a reasonable suspicion that some other person has committed an offence.

3. The officer must immediately intimate the nearest Executive Magistrate empowered to hold inquests, proceed to the place where the body is, and there, in the presence of two or more respectable inhabitants of the neighbourhood, make an investigation and draw up a report.

4. The report describes the wounds, fractures, bruises and other marks of injury and states in what manner or by what weapon they appear to have been inflicted. It is signed by the officer and the witnesses and forwarded to the District or Sub-divisional Magistrate.

5. An inquest report is not substantive evidence, and discrepancies on matters outside the scope of the inquest are immaterial: Radha Mohan Singh.

6. Statements recorded in the course of an inquest are police statements governed by section 181: not signed, and usable only to contradict.

7. Section 194(3): the body shall be forwarded for post-mortem where there is any doubt as to the cause, where the officer considers it expedient, and in the cases concerning the death of a woman within seven years of her marriage — suicide, suspicious circumstances, a relative’s request, or a dowry death.

8. In those cases the officer has no discretion. The single exception is where the weather and the distance make forwarding impossible without risk of putrefaction rendering the examination useless.

9. Section 196(1): a Magistrate empowered to hold inquests shall in the specified cases, and may in any other, hold an inquiry into the cause of death, either instead of or in addition to the police investigation, and may disinter the body.

10. Section 196(3): where a person dies or disappears, or a woman is raped, while in custody, an inquiry shall be held by a Judicial Magistrate, in addition to the investigation under the Sanhita.