KSLU Solved Question Papers
Criminal Law I
Previous Year Question Paper with Solution
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) · Sem 4
2022 Oct Examination
munotes.in
Mumbai
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) Sem 4 Criminal Law I 2022 Oct Question Paper with Solutions
First published on munotes.in on 21 October 2026.
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Contents
The questions below are the paper as Karnataka State Law University set it at the 2022 Oct examination, in the order it was set.
MarksPage
MarksPage
The Paper as Set
The questions in this volume are the questions asked at the 2022 Oct examination, reproduced as Karnataka State Law University set them, in the order it set them. Long reading passages are shortened to their first and last lines and our summary; the original paper prints them in full. Only the answers are ours. See the original question paper.
Duration 3 hours · Total marks 80 · 20 questions answered
Instructions printed on the paper
- N.B. (1) Answer all the questions. (2) One essay type question and short note/problem is compulsory. (3) Figures to the right indicate marks. (4) Answer should be written in English or Kannada completely.
How to use this volume
Solve the paper first, under exam conditions and against the clock. Then read the answers here and mark your own. Reading a solution before attempting the question feels productive and teaches very little, because recognising an answer is not the same as being able to write one.
Q1
Unit I
(a)"Mens rea is an integral concept of criminal law." Discuss.[10]
Answer
For full marks, cover: what the statement claims, and the maxim behind it; the case for it: (1) blame needs a choice, (2) the mind grades one act into different crimes, (3) the General Exceptions excuse an innocent mind (Ram Bahadur Thapa), (4) the courts read a guilty mind into silent statutes (Nathulal); the case against it: (1) the Indian Penal Code never uses the words, (2) strict liability (Mayer Hans George), (3) a mind the law supplies by fiction (Basdev), (4) negligence, which is not intention at all (Jacob Mathew); a reasoned verdict; the position under the Sanhita; a conclusion.
What the statement claims
The statement rests on the maxim actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea. It means that an act does not make a person guilty unless the mind is also guilty. So a crime has two parts: a guilty act (actus reus) and a guilty mind (mens rea). To call mens rea "integral" is to say it is built into criminal law, so that without it there is no crime at all. That claim is largely true, but not wholly. The answer below sets out the case for it, then the case against it, and then a verdict.
The case for the statement
1. Punishment needs blame, and blame needs a choice. Criminal law does more than make a person pay for harm, as civil law does. It condemns him. Condemnation is fair only for a person who chose to do wrong. A man who knocks over a pedestrian in a sudden fit, with no warning, has caused harm but made no choice. Punishing him would teach nobody anything.
2. The mind grades one act into different crimes. The same physical act becomes different offences under the Indian Penal Code, 1860 according to the mind behind it. Take one death.
- Caused with intention to kill, it is murder (section 300), punishable with death or life.
- Caused with knowledge that death is likely, it may be culpable homicide not amounting to murder (section 304).
- Caused by a rash or negligent act, it is section 304A, with up to two years.
Taking property shows the same thing. Moving another's property dishonestly is theft. Moving it in good faith, believing it to be one's own, is no offence (illustration (p) to section 378). Without the mental element the Code could not draw these lines at all.
3. The General Exceptions excuse an innocent mind. Chapter IV of the Code removes liability where the mind is not guilty: mistake of fact, accident, infancy, unsoundness of mind and involuntary intoxication.
Facts. In State of Orissa v. Ram Bahadur Thapa, AIR 1960 Ori 161, decided on 9 November 1959, an old aerodrome was said to be haunted. A Nepali servant, new to the area and a firm believer in ghosts, went there at midnight with his employer to see them. He saw figures round a flickering light and ran at them with his khurki. They were village women gathering mahua flowers by a lantern, and one was killed.
Held. Section 79 protected him. Good faith is judged by the capacity of the actual accused in his actual situation. He honestly believed he was striking ghosts, so he had no guilty mind.
4. The courts read a guilty mind into silent statutes. Many modern laws create offences without saying anything about intention.
Facts. In Nathulal v. State of Madhya Pradesh, AIR 1966 SC 43, decided on 22 March 1965, a dealer at Dhar stored 885 maunds of wheat without a licence. He had applied, paid the fee, sent his returns, and was never told his application was refused.
Held. He was acquitted. Mens rea is an essential ingredient of a criminal offence. A statute is read in line with the common law unless it excludes a guilty mind expressly or by necessary implication.
Why these bear. On this side of the argument, mens rea is the rule. It is excluded only on clear grounds.
The case against the statement
1. The Code never uses the words. The Indian Penal Code contains no general clause requiring mens rea. Instead it writes a particular mental element into each definition: "intentionally", "knowingly", "dishonestly", "fraudulently", "voluntarily", "reason to believe". So mens rea is not one concept in the Code. It is a family of different mental states, chosen offence by offence.
2. Strict liability. Some offences need no guilty mind at all.
Facts. In State of Maharashtra v. Mayer Hans George, AIR 1965 SC 722, decided on 24 August 1964, a German passenger flew from Zurich to Manila through Bombay. He wore a jacket with twenty-eight compartments holding about thirty-four kilos of gold. He had not declared it, and said he did not know of a Reserve Bank notification requiring a declaration.
Held. By a majority, his knowledge of the notification need not be proved. The anti-smuggling law would be frustrated if the prosecution had to prove it. Subba Rao J. dissented.
3. A mind supplied by fiction. Sometimes the law treats a person as having a mind he did not have.
Facts. In Basdev v. State of Pepsu, AIR 1956 SC 488, decided on 17 April 1956, a drunk retired jamadar shot dead a boy who would not give up his seat at a wedding.
Held. Under section 86, a drunk person is treated as having the knowledge he would have had if sober. His intention is gathered from the facts and the degree of drink. His murder conviction was upheld. The knowledge was supplied by law, not found in his mind.
4. Negligence is not intention. Section 304A punishes a death caused by a rash or negligent act. The accused intends no harm at all.
Facts. In Jacob Mathew v. State of Punjab, AIR 2005 SC 3180, decided on 5 August 2005, a patient in a Ludhiana hospital died when the oxygen cylinder connected to him was found to be empty. The doctor was prosecuted under section 304A.
Held. Negligence becomes criminal only when it is "gross or of a very high degree". The empty cylinder was at most the hospital's failure, and the prosecution of the doctor was quashed.
Why these bear. Criminal negligence punishes a failure to think. It is fault, but it is not a guilty mind in the full sense of the maxim.
Verdict
Both sides are partly right. Mens rea is integral as a principle: a crime ordinarily needs a guilty mind, the Code grades offences by it, and the courts presume it. It is not integral as an absolute rule. Parliament may exclude it where a law cannot otherwise work, and the Code itself accepts negligence and imputed knowledge. The better statement is this: no crime without fault, and full mens rea for every serious crime. The exceptions are narrow, and they mostly concern regulatory offences with light punishment.
Under the Sanhita
The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 keeps the same method. Its definitions of "dishonestly", "fraudulently", "reason to believe" and "voluntarily" sit in section 2, clauses (7), (9), (29) and (33). Its General Exceptions are sections 14 to 44, mistake of fact being section 17 and intoxication sections 23 and 24. Causing death by negligence is now section 106. So the Sanhita, like the Code, makes mens rea integral by writing it into each offence.
Conclusion. The statement is true as a principle and overstated as a rule. Mens rea is integral because criminal punishment condemns, and condemnation needs a choice. The Code grades offences by the mind, excuses the innocent mind, and the courts presume a guilty mind in silent statutes, as Nathulal holds. But the Code states no general rule. Strict liability survives where a law would otherwise fail, as Mayer Hans George shows. Negligence and imputed knowledge stand in for intention in some offences. Mens rea is the rule of criminal law, with narrow and justified exceptions.
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