[COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEAL]

1954 Present: Rose C.J. (President), Pulle J., Swan I., Sansoni J.
and Fernando A.J.

D. M. MUTHU BANDA, Appellant, and THE QUEEN, Respondent
APPEAL NO. 52 OF 1954

 S. C. 39-M. C. Kandy, 5,2m

Culpable homicide-Provocation-Intoxication-Scope of its relevancy-Penal Code, s. 294, Exception 1.

When considering, in a prosecution for murder, whether the accused was deprived of the power of self-control by grave and sudden provocation, the jury must apply an objective test, i.e., whether in the particular case under consideration a reasonable or average man with the same background and in the circumstance of life as the accused would have been provoked into serious retaliation. The effect of this proposition is that the intoxication of the accused is not to be regarded as affecting the gravity of the provocation offered, and should only be taken into account, together with the idiosyncrasies of health and temperament, when the jury determine subjectively whether or not the accused lost his self-control under the stress of the provocation.

The King v. Punchirala (1924) 25 N. L. R. 458, overruled.
APPEAL against a