Death sentence, no answer to any crime

The hanging of four men convicted of the rape and murder of a 23-year-old women in Delhi in 2012 has been held by many as a victory and assertion of justice. It was celebrated in parts of the country and many consider that the executions were unnecessarily delayed through obstructionist tactics. The parents of the woman have said that their daughter’s soul would now rest in peace. The parents’ sentiments and the emotional responses of many others are not difficult to understand. It cannot also denied that the crime was most gruesome and abhorrent.

But justice should not be based on emotions, and to be carried away by them is to miss the right judgment. The death sentence is not the answer to a crime, however heinous it is. The Verma Committee report, based on which changes were made in laws relating crimes against women, had disapproved of the death penalty as punishment for rape. The main justification for the death penalty is that it would be a deterrent against crimes, but this is wrong. The number of rapes and other crimes against women has not come down after the Nirbhaya case and the award of the death penalty to the accused. An important principle of criminal jurisprudence is that it is the certainty of punishment, not its severity, that deters crime. Many rape cases are not properly investigated and the conviction rate is low. The possibility of death penalty may actually prompt a rapist to kill the victim to ensure that there is no evidence especially because most rapists are known to the victims. Capital punishment is based on a primitive idea of justice which should have no place in modern civilised society. The aim of a modern system of justice should be reformation, not retribution.

Most countries have either abolished the death penalty or are not implementing it even if the provision exists in the penal code. The United Nations called upon all countries to stop capital punishment or to put a moratorium on it, the day after the executions were carried out in Delhi. Unfortunately, calls for a populist variety of justice, seen in the demands for the harshest punishment to be meted out instantly even outside the legal system, are getting louder in India. This was seen in the calls for public hanging of the Delhi case convicts. This was also seen in the celebration of the killing of suspects by the police in a Hyderabad gang rape and murder case last year. These are signs of brutalisation of the mind and disrespect for the rule of law. Neither the state nor society has the right to take a person’s life.