Do away with the death penalty itself

The Supreme Court’s move to examine if there are more humane alternatives to “hanging by the neck until death” as a method of legal execution has again drawn attention to the wrong and unfair nature of the death penalty. While the search for a less painful method shows a welcome concern of the court over the physical and mental state of the condemned person in the last moments, the real alternative to a sordid and painful execution is no execution at all.

The court has said that options like electrocution and execution by firing squads and by injection cannot be considered painless, and there are chances of errors and bungling. The court is inclined to set up an experts’ panel to examine the desirability of hanging, if the government does not do so. It said it is also ready to declare hanging unconstitutional if there is scientific material favouring a different method of execution as less painful and “more consistent with human dignity.”

The real problem with death sentence is not the method of execution and whether it is painful or not. Human dignity is certainly the issue, and the execution of any person by the State is an affront to human dignity. No killing is humane. The Supreme Court has itself recognised that death sentence is basically different from other punishments. That is why it has prescribed that it should be awarded only in the rarest of rare cases.

In another judgement, it ruled that hanging should be “as painless as possible” and “cause no greater pain than any other known method”. It has mandated that the case for death penalty should be decided on the most stringent evaluation and there should be opportunities for review after appeals. It has also taken a more sympathetic and positive view on clemency petitions. The present concern of the court may be seen as a continuation of the line of thinking that runs through these judgements. It is clear that that thinking is not very comfortable with the death penalty, though it has upheld it, and the method of execution.

The natural culmination of this thinking will ideally be disapproval of the death penalty as such. It is a barbaric punishment derived from a vindictive jurisprudence, and does not agree with an enlightened idea of crime and punishment. Society’s, and therefore the law’s, aim should be to reform a criminal and to make him fit for society again. Many countries have abolished capital punishment and many others are in the process of doing so. The present thinking in the Supreme Court will hopefully lead to its abolition in India too.