Solved Exercise for Precis writing for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

When acts are made punishable on the ground that those acts produce or are likely to produce certain evil effects, to what extent ought omissions, which produce or are likely to produce, the same evil effects, to be made punishable?

Two things are evident: first, that some of these omissions ought to be punished in exactly the same manner in which acts are punished; secondly, that all these omissions ought not to be punished. It will hardly be disputed that a gaoler (jailor) who voluntarily causes the death of a prisoner by omitting to supply that prisoner with food or a nurse who voluntarily causes the death of an infant entrusted to her care by omitting to take it out of a tub of water into which it has fallen, ought to be treated as guilty of murder. On the other hand, it will hardly be maintained that a man should be punished as a murderer because he omitted to relieve a beggar, even though there might be the clearest proof that the death of the beggar was the effect of this omission and the man who omitted to give the alms knew that the death of the beggar was likely to be the effect of the omission. It is difficult to say whether a penal code which should put no omissions on the same footing with acts, or a penal code which should put all omissions on the same footing with acts, would produce consequences more absurd and revolting. There is no country in which either of these principles is adopted. Indeed, it is hard to conceive how, if either were adopted, society could be held together.

It is plain, therefore, that a middle course must be taken, but it is not easy to determine what that middle course ought to be. The absurdity of the two extremes is obvious. But there are innumerable intermediate points; and wherever the line of demarcation may be drawn, it will include some cases which ought really to have been exempted, and will exempt some which ought really to have been included.

Precis

The question may be posed that when acts are made punishable on the ground that they produce certain evil effects to what extent omissions which likewise produce the same evil effects, be made punishable. It would be an extreme view that penal codes should or should not put all omissions on the same footings with acts. A rational view would be that omissions which had the same evil effect as acts themselves shall be likewise punished provided that they were on other grounds illegal

(84 words)