Revisiting Criminal Responsibility In India: Insanity Defence, Forensic Psychiatry And The Transformative Impact Of The Mental Healthcare Act, 2017
- IJLLR Journal
- Jan 25
- 1 min read
Nitika Khidtta, Ph.D. Research Scholar, Department of Laws, Himachal Pradesh University.
Dr. Shiv Kumar Dogra, Professor, Department of Laws, Himachal Pradesh University.
ABSTRACT
The relationship between mental illness and criminal responsibility remains one of the most complex areas of criminal law in India. Section 84 of the Indian Penal Code, rooted in the nineteenth-century McNaughten’s Rule, continues to regulate the insanity defence despite significant advances in psychiatry, neuroscience and behavioural sciences. This reliance on a narrow cognitive test creates a clear disconnect between modern medical knowledge and legal doctrine, often resulting in courts struggling to assess psychiatric conditions and excluding genuinely mentally ill accused persons from legal protection.
The Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 marks a decisive shift from a custodial to a rights-based approach, emphasizing dignity, autonomy, informed consent, non-discrimination and access to appropriate treatment. Although it does not formally amend Section 84 IPC, the Act has substantial implications for criminal adjudication, forensic psychiatric assessments, competency determinations and the treatment of accused persons with mental illness. This paper critically examines the doctrinal limitations of the insanity defence, the gap between legal and medical understandings of mental illness, and the impact of the MHCA 2017, while drawing on comparative international models to propose reforms aligning criminal law with contemporary science and human rights obligations.
