Can Death Penalty Be Ever Justified?

Criminals should be punished so that they and others will be less likely to commit a crime in the future, making everybody safer.”

The execution of a murderer and some other capital offences carry the death penalty (serious crimes, especially murder, which are punishable by death). Any state legislature may impose the death penalty, sometimes known as capital punishment, for murder and other serious offences. For a variety of crimes, such as murder, rape, false prophecy, blasphemy, armed robbery, chronic drug usage, apostasy, adultery, witchcraft, and sorcery, the death penalty may be applied. The execution method may include beheading with a sword, firing squad, or even stoning.

The death penalty, commonly referred to as capital punishment, is a legal procedure whereby the state executes a death row convict as retribution for a serious crime committed. Both advocates for and opponents of the death sentence have strong feelings on the matter, even though not all crimes carry the death penalty.

The death penalty is inhumane, brutal, and humiliating. Regardless of the accuser, the offence, the accused’s guilt or innocence, or the method of execution, a larger portion of civilised society is always opposed to the death penalty.

India enacted the Indian Penal Code in 1861, which accommodated capital punishment for murder. Abolishing capital punishment was communicated by a few individuals from the Constituent Assembly during the drafting of the Indian Constitution somewhere in the years of 1947 and 1949, yet no such provision was incorporated in the Constitution. In the following twenty years, in order to abolish capital punishment, private members; Bills were presented in both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, yet none of them were adopted.

Between 1950 and 1980, there may have been between 3000 and 4000 executions. The number of people who were given death sentences and put to death between 1980 and the middle of the 1990s is more challenging to count. Two or three executions by hanging are thought to occur annually. The Supreme Court in 1980 determined in the Bachan Singh case judgement that the death penalty should only be applied in the “rarest of rare” circumstances, yet it is unclear what constitutes the rarest of the rare.

Pros and Cons of the Death Penalty

Pros

• A potent deterrence is needed to stop violent crimes in society. A law’s main purpose is to prevent crime by acting as a deterrent. The use of the death penalty as a deterrent, which is reserved for extreme circumstances, sends a message that repeats offenders will face severe penalties. Additionally, this would aid in stopping the crime before it even starts.
• There are instances of horrifying crimes that cannot be remedied. In these situations, the death penalty not only results in a just punishment commensurate with the crime committed but also ensures the protection of society as a whole. Additionally, it stops comparable acts from being committed in the foreseeable future.
• The death penalty eliminates the opportunity for a chance of escape from the consequences of a criminal’s actions. It eliminates the possibility of an illegal escape.

Cons

• Capital punishment many times does not show its effect on the rates of violent crime. It is quite ironic but the states with the most executions have the highest murder rates. It is, for this reason, that capital punishment seems ineffective for the motive it was created.
• In a country like India wherein many cases justice seems to be an ideal type which is hard to get, there are many cases where innocent people come within the clutches of the Death Penalty. Though an exact number for such cases is impossible to be checked, this is a fact that cannot be denied.
• Capital Punishment simply takes away the right of a criminal who may prefer to get rehabilitated. It eliminates such possibilities where a person who is not a habitual offender can seek a chance to rehabilitate. It assumes that nothing can be done about an offender which is simply in violation of his/her rights.

In most of countries, the death penalty has been abolished, while recognizing that the death penalty has no place in a democratic and civilised society. But, India is among those countries which still uphold the death penalty. The tremendous social support and desire for the death sentence led India’s legislators to broaden the country’s death penalty law. In response to the outcry following the Delhi rape case, the Parliament revised the Juvenile Justice Act to allow the death penalty for minors beyond the age of 17 who have committed heinous crimes. Similar to this, the Andhra Pradesh State Legislature changed the Indian Penal Code and included the death penalty for rape. However, the judges who decide on the severity of the sentence are not chosen by the general public and are not required to follow popular opinion.

Even though there are campaigns against the death penalty, several nations still use it. Thirty nations have declared drug trafficking a crime punishable by death. Three-fourths of all 2000 cases involved drug offences, and Singapore has by far the highest rate of executions. About 20 countries have the death penalty as an option for economic offences. In more than 24 nations, including India, certain types of sexual offences are punishable by death.

International Views on Capital Punishment

In the United States, where 60% of the states still practice the capital sentence, only six states account for nearly two-thirds of all executions since 1976. Even while the number of executions around the world changes on an annual basis, nations like Belarus, the Congo, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, Singapore use capital punishment on a regular basis. India has till date retained the death penalty and carry out executions from time to time in the rarest of rare cases. In cases of minors committing crimes, there are only a few countries that allow the execution of such minors. Executions of minor offenders are strictly prohibited under the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Special  Factors On The Death Penalty Jurisprudence In India

Capital punishment in India is a legal penalty for some crimes under the country’s main substantive penal legislation, the Indian Penal Code, as well as other laws.

At the time of Independence, India retained several laws put in place by the British colonial government, including capital punishment for various crimes under the IPC.

A crucial change in the law was made in 1955 when the Parliament repealed Section 367(5) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), which until then mandated the courts to record reasons why it decided not to impose a sentence of death for offences where the death penalty was an option. The CrPC was re-enacted in 1973 where several changes were made, notably to Section 354(3) mandating judges to provide special reasons for why they imposed the death sentence.

A recent sexual offence trend in India is as follows:

According to NLU Delhi’s research on the death penalty, rape and murder offences are far more likely to result in the death penalty than other offences. Rape is without a doubt among the most horrific crimes. However, the high rate of death sentences handed down in such situations (52.4 percent of capital punishments handed down by trial courts in 2019) calls into question the courts’ supposed objectivity. Judges shouldn’t ever serve as the public’s spokesperson because they are not. Many legal experts believe that the public’s support for the death penalty influences the trial court judges. The majority’s opinion is the public opinion. The Judiciary should be governed by the principles of constitutionalism and not by majority opinion.

According to recent statistics, more death row inmates in India come from the lower social strata. According to data compiled by the Death Penalty Research Project at National Law University in Delhi, over 75% of people on death row come from underprivileged socioeconomic groups or religious minorities, and the majority of inmates’ families are also poor. These people, who are economically and socially disadvantaged, are unable to afford high-priced legal counsel and adequate court representation.

Supreme Court on Validity of Capital Punishment in India

All people have the fundamental right to life and liberty under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. It further states that only in accordance with legally prescribed procedures may someone be deprived of their life or personal freedom. This has been interpreted legally to suggest that the state may take someone’s life by enacting a law if there is a method that is just and valid. The central government has often stated that it would maintain the death sentence as a legal sanction for those who pose a threat to society and as a deterrent.

The Supreme Court to has upheld the constitutional validity of capital punishment in “rarest of rare” cases. In Jagmohan Singh vs State of Uttar Pradesh (1973), then in Rajendra Prasad vs State of Uttar Pradesh (1979), and finally in Bachan Singh vs State of Punjab (1980), the Supreme Court affirmed the constitutional validity of the death penalty. It said that if capital punishment is provided in the law and the procedure is a fair, just, and reasonable one, the death sentence can be awarded to a convict. This will, however, only be in the “rarest of rare” cases, and the courts should render “special reasons” while sending a person to the gallows.

Case Laws

In Jagmohan v. State of U.P,[4] the Supreme Court held that Articles 14, 19 and 21 did not violate the death penalty. The judge was said to make the choice between the death penalty and life imprisonment based on circumstances, facts, and the nature of the crime recorded during the trial. The decision to award the death penalty was therefore made in accordance with the procedure laid down by law as required by Article 21.

But, in Rajendra Prasad v. State of U.P,[5] the judge held that unless it was shown that the criminal was dangerous to society, capital punishment would not be justified. The learned judge pleads that the death penalty is abolished and said that it should be retained only for “white collar crimes”. It was also held that the death penalty for the murder offence awarded pursuant to I.P.C. Section 302 did not violate the constitution’s basic feature.

But, in  Bachan Singh, v. State of Punjab,[6] explained that, the constitutional bench of the Supreme Court has acknowledged Article 21 the State’s power to take away someone’s life in line with a legal process that is equitable, fair, and reasonable. Furthermore, the imposition of the death penalty for murder under Section 302 I.P.C. does not violate the fundamental principles of the Constitution.

Conclusion

The death penalty is an absurd punishment because it doesn’t demonstrate why murder is bad by killing someone who has already killed someone. The majority of civilised nations have eliminated it. It serves no function, hence India most definitely doesn’t need it. The death penalty deters murder more than life in prison, according to no study. The evidence is overwhelmingly against you. The harshness of the penalty must coexist with the certainty and promptness of the punishment for deterrence to be effective. Terrorism, murder, or even thievery have not been deterred by the death penalty. In England, stealing carried the death sentence for more than a century, and onlookers at public hangings frequently had their pockets searched. Abolishing the death penalty will ease, not enhance, the tax-payer’s burden. The annual cost of maintaining a prisoner is about ₹30,000. The hangman is paid more, and we also save on the protracted litigation that death cases involve.

Constitutional, legal and policy issues cannot be determined by the victim’s understandable hunger for revenge without leading to a frenzy where the death penalty is demanded, as it often is, for wholly inappropriate cases.

The article has been contributed by Ishika Agarwal, a student of Uttaranchal University, Law College, Dehradun.