INTRODUCTION
We know the Indian Constitution provides citizens of India for with extensive rights and liberties. The ambit of Article 19 and 21 is way wide than one thinks and provides every citizen of India with basic 6 Fundamental Rights.
Article 21 of the Indian Constitution deals with the Right to life and personal liberty of a person. It states that “it shall deprive no person of his life and personal liberty except for the procedure established by law”. Where on one hand the constitution itself ensures the guarantee of the right to life, on the other side we are talking about the death penalty?
For the purpose of avoiding this confusion, there are explanations and certain situations which demands, it shall punish a person with death for the offence committed by him. It is to be clearly understood that not all the offences are punishable with death. Rather, a person becomes liable to capital punishment if he commits any of the heinous or serious crime.
Also, in a landmark judgment, Supreme Court held that “if the punishment for an offence committed is death and the court awards a lesser punishment, in such cases the court has to give in writing the reasons it awarded the lesser amount of punishment”.
The constitutional validity of the death penalty has been an issue for a long time. To maintain the scope and ambit of the death penalty, Supreme Court with Bachan Singh vs. State of Punjab
restricted the death penalty only to the cases of murder.
WHAT DOES THE TERM DEATH PENALTY MEAN?
Death Penalty or Capital punishment, as the name suggests, is a government-sanctioned process of taking a person’s life by the State Government following the due procedures of the law. Also, it only gives Death Penalty to a person who has committed a criminal offence. In the present situation, there is a trend to abolish or remove death penalty and punish a person according to the crime committed by him.
However, India is one country where courts may punish a man with Capital punishment or the death penalty. The death penalty is the extreme or the aggravated form of punishment.
As defined under the Indian Penal Code, it shall punish a man with the death penalty if the act committed by him comes within the purview of “Rarest of the rare cases”. In the case of Machhi Singh vs. State of Punjab, the Supreme Court passed a few guidelines which need to be considered while deciding whether the case falls within the category of rarest of rare cases or not. The guidelines are:
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The manner of the Commission of Crime
The intention of a person can be very well understood by the manner of crime committed by him. The court stated that “if someone committed the crime in a very brutal and extreme condition, it will fall under the category of the rarest of the rare cases.”
Say for an example- if a man intentionally sets the house of another person on fire where he knows such an act is likely to cause death or his intention is to burn alive the person. Where a man inhumanly chops the body of another person where a person extremely tortures another person. All these acts amount to the death penalty as these are one of the heinous crimes.
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The motive for Commission of the Crime
Motive and guilty intention play a major role in establishing any criminal offence. To determine the nature of the crime, the motive of committing such actions need to be proved.
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The magnitude of the Crime
This means when the crime is against numerous people. Say for an instance, if a person kills all the members of a family, it tells that he has committed the offence which comes in the category of rarest of rare cases and is liable to the death penalty with the proper discretion of the court.
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Socially abhorrent Nature of Crime
If the crime committed is socially awful or irrelevant, say for an example- killing a person belonging from a backward class or burning bride also known as dowry death (defined under section 304 B IPC), if the demands for dowry remains due and so on.
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Victim of the Crime
If the crime committed is against a minor child or a helpless woman, an old person, a mentally challenged person or a public figure. The acts committed against such people would also fall in the category of rarest of rare cases.
Apart from the guidelines amounting to the death penalty, there have been new amendments in the law. In the present scenario:
- India’s Cabinet has approved the introduction of the death penalty for those who rape children.
- The new law applies to people convicted of raping a child. This includes both male and female below the age of 12 years.
- Also, the new law extends the term of imprisonment for the rape committed against a girl below the age of 16 and women.
New amendments made in relation to the two recent rape cases:
- Cases where the rape was fatal, and the victim falls in the vegetative state.
- Kathua Rape Case- The rape of an 8-year-old Muslim girl by Hindu men in Kathua.
- Rape of a 16-year-old girl in Uttar Pradesh by a member of the Bharatiya Janta Party.
According to the reports of the Amnesty International, Indian Courts awarded 109 death sentences in the year 2017.
Conclusion
Hence, India being a democratic and republic country is one country that has kept the death penalty. Although, in India, the Judiciary follows the reformative form of the punishment. This simply means the longer term of imprisonment depending on the offence committed.
If someone has committed a serious offence against the public tranquility and wrong against the whole society. He shall be liable to the death penalty as prescribed by the court.
We have witnessed the recent amendments in the criminal law relating to the death penalty and executions made to date.
The President of India or the Chief Justice of India can only relinquish or can lower down the punishment leading to the death penalty. The status remains the same whether the death penalty should be abolished or shall be retained in the same manner.
Hence, in a matter, where the person got punishment for murdering 3 people thereover Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, lessen his punishment of death penalty to life imprisonment.
On the same hand, The Court, with a majority of 2:1 upheld that the Death Penalty is valid in law. Besides this, they provide the aspects of punishing a person with the death penalty in the Judgments of Bachan Singh and Machhi Singh.