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"Whoever cause death by doing an act with the intention of causing death, or with the intention of causing such bodily injury as is likely to cause death, or with the knowledge that he is likely by such act to cause death, commits the offence of culpable homicide."

Consequently, the material relied upon by the prosecution for framing a charge under Section 304 Part II must at least prima facie indicate that the accused had done an act which had caused death with at least such a knowledge that he was by such act likely to cause death. The entire material which the prosecution relied upon before the trial court for framing the charge and to which we have made a detailed reference earlier, in our view, cannot support such a charge unless it indicates prima facie that on that fateful night when the Plant was run at Bhopal it was run by the accused concerned with the knowledge that such running of the plant was likely to cause deaths of human beings. It cannot be disputed that ere act of running a Plant as per the permission granted by the authorities would not be a criminal act. Even assuming that it was a defective Plant and it was dealing with a very toxic and hazardous substance like MIC the mere act of storing such a material by th accused in Tank NO. 610 could not even prima facie suggest that the accused concerned thereby had knowledge that they were likely to cause death of human beings. In fairness to the prosecution it was not suggested and could not be suggested that the accused had an intention to kill any human being while operating the Plant. Similarly on the aforesaid material placed on record it could not be even prima facie suggested that the accused had an intention to kill any human being while operating the Plant. Similarly on the aforesaid material placed on record it could not be even prima facie suggested by the prosecution that any of the accused had a knowledge that by operating the plant on that fateful night whereat such dangerous and highly volatile substance like MIC was stored they had the knowledge that by this very act itself they were likely to cause death of any human being. Consequently, in our view taking the entire material as aforesaid on its face value and assuming it to represent the correct factual position in connection with the operation of the Plant at Bhopal on that fateful night it could not be said that the said material even prima facie called for framing of a charge against the accused concerned under Section 304 Part II IPC on the specious plea that the said act of the accused amounted to culpable homicide only because the operation of the Plant on that night ultimately resulted in deaths of a number of human beings and cattle. It is also pertinent to note that when the complaint was originally filed suo motu by the police authorities at Bhopal and the criminal case was registered at the Police Station Hanumanganj, Bhopal as Case No. 1104 of 1984 it was registered under Section 304-A of the IPC. We will come to that provision a little later. Suffice it to say at this stage that on the entire material produced by the prosecution in support of the charge it could not be said even prima facie that it made the accused liable to face the charge under Section 304 Part-II. In this connection we may refer to a decision of the Calcutta High Court to which our attention was drawn by the learned Senior Counsel, Shri Rajendra Singh for the appellants. In the case of Adam Ali Taluqdar v. King- Emperor a Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court made the following pertinent observations which interpreting Section 304 Part-II read with Section 34 IPC :

"Although to constitute an offence under Section 304, Part 2, there must be no intention of causing death or such injury as the offender knew as likely to cause death, there must still be a common intention to do an action with the knowledge that it is likely to cause death though without the intention of causing death. Each of the assailants may know that the act, they are jointly doing, is one that is likely to cause death but have no intention to causing death, yet they may certainly have the common intention to do that act and therefore Section 34 can apply to a case under Section 304, Part2."

15. The relevant portion of Section 304 of the IPC reads as under:-

"Whoever commits culpable homicide not amounting to murder shall be punished with ... and shall also be liable to fine, if the act by which the death is caused is done with the intention of causing death, or of causing such bodily injury as is likely to cause death;
or with ...... if the act is done with the knowledge that it is likely to cause death, but without any intention to cause death or to cause such bodily injury as is likely to cause death."

16. A plain reading of the above Section makes it clear that it is in two parts. The first part of the Section is generally referred to as "Section 304 Part-I", whereas the second part as "Section 304, Part- II". It would thus, appear that if such bodily injury as is likely to cause death is intentionally caused and results in the death of the victim, the case would fall under Part-I and not under Part-II. Stated differently, Part-II comes into play when death is caused by doing an act with the knowledge that it is likely to cause death and when such act is the infliction of a bodily injury, the infliction must not be intentional. A person who intentionally causes the bodily injury with knowledge that such act is likely to cause death must necessarily be a person who does an act with the intent to cause bodily injury likely to result in death.