The petitioners are before this Court calling in question

proceedings in Crime No.126/2021 registered for offences

punishable under Section 304A read with Section 34 of IPC.

3

2.

Heard Sri. S.G. Bhagavan, learned counsel appearing

for the petitioners, Smt. Yashoda K.P., learned HCGP appearing

for respondent No.1 and Sri. V.G. Rajendra, learned counsel

appearing for respondent No.2 and have perused the material on

record.

3.

The petitioners are the owners of one M.P.P.

Technologies Private Limited. Respondent No.2 is the wife of an

employee, who died in an accident that occurred in the factory

premises owned by the petitioners. One H.D. Manjunath, a

contract worker, who was performing certain jobs of cleaning of

the roof of the factory on 05.09.2021, fell down and sustained

injuries and succumbed to the same on 10.09.2021. The

Inspector of factories, who visited the premises also recorded the

incident and also noticed the fact that family of the deceased

had been adequately compensated. It is for that reason, no

proceedings under Section 92 of the Factories Act, 1948 was

initiated by the Inspector of factories against the petitioners.

4

4.

After all the aforesaid facts and the incident, a

complaint is registered by the wife of the deceased on

10.09.2021 alleging that the reason for death of her husband

deceased was an unkept factory premises with no safety

measures. The complaint becomes an FIR for offence punishable

under Section 304A of IPC. It is germane to notice Section 304A,

it reads as follows:

<[304A. Causing death by negligence.4

Whoever causes the death of any person by doing

any rash or negligent act not amounting to

culpable homicide, shall be punished with

imprisonment of either description for a term

which may extend to two years, or with fine, or

with both.]=

Section 304A of the IPC has two components:

Causing death either by rash or a negligent act.

Neither rash nor negligent act can be attributed to the

petitioners for the unfortunate incident of the deceased dying

due to an accident that occurred when he fell down while

painting the roof of the factory. The Apex Court in the case of

5

AMBALAL D. BHATT V. STATE OF GUJARAT¹, has held as

follows:

<10. It appears to us that in a prosecution for

an offence under Section 304-A, the mere fact that

an accused contravenes certain rules or regulations

in the doing of an act which causes death of

another, does not establish that the death was the

result of a rash or negligent act or that any such act

was the proximate and efficient cause of the death.

If that were so, the acquittal of the appellant for

contravention of the provisions of the Act and the

Rules would itself have been an answer and we

would

have

then

examined

to

what

extent

additional evidence of his acquittal would have to

be allowed, but since that is not the criteria, we

have to determine whether the appellant's act in

giving only one batch number to all the four lots

manufactured on November 12, 1962, in preparing

Batch No. 211105, was the cause of deaths and

whether those deaths were a direct consequence of

the appellants' act, that is, whether the appellants'

act is the direct result of a rash and negligent act

and that act was the proximate and efficient cause

1 (1973) 3 SCC 525

6

without the intervention of another's negligence. As

observed by Sir Lawrence Jenkins in Emperor v.

Omkar Rampratap [(1902) 4 Bom LR 679] the act

causing the deaths <must be the causa causans; it

is not enough that it may have been the cause sine

qua non=. This view has been adopted by this Court

in

several

decisions.

In

Kurban

Hussein

Mohammedali Rangwala v. State of Maharashtra

[(1965) 2 SCR 622] the accused who had

manufactured wet paints without a licence was

acquitted of the charge under Section 304-A

because it was held that the mere fact that he

allowed the burners to be used in the same room in

which varnish and turpentine were stored, even

though it would be a negligent act, would not be

enough to make t