Sunday, October 16, 2011

Death sentence is judicial murder, says judge in Rajiv killing

K.T. Thomas the ex-Supreme Court Judge of India who wrote the judgement in the Rajiv Gandhi Murder case has said to India today that 'death sentence is judicial murder'. Though the statement is welcome from a ex-supreme court judge of India, it is surprising that why did he agree to award death sentence along with the other judges in the Rajiv Gandhi murder case. The question remains whether Justice K.T. Thomas had a similar belief regarding death sentence while he was still a supreme court judge or it changed after he retired as a judge. If he had a similar belief about death sentence then he should have made it clear in his judgements and if it has changed in the recent past after his retirement the people of this country deserve to know what made him change his mind on death sentence.
Below is the article which appeared on the website of India Today.
The above comment is authored by Vijay Hiremath
________________________________________________________________________________


Death sentence is judicial murder, says former Supreme Court judge K.T. Thomas, who headed the bench that pronounced death punishment to three conspirators in Rajiv Gandhi's assassination.

"Death sentence is no punishment," Thomas, 74, said. "It is a judicial murder committed with the protection of the society."

According to Thomas, world opinion is turning against the death penalty with more and more countries abolishing it.

"In India too the debate is active among rights activists, judicial circles and civil society," Thomas said. "But ultimately, it is a political decision."

If he was against the death sentence, why did he agree to awarding death penalty to the three Rajiv killers -- Murugan, Santhan and Perarivalan?

"Because I took oath to discharge my duties as per the Constitution and the prevailing laws," replied the former judge. "Whatever extreme may be my individual views, as a judge, I had to function as per the existing laws."

He said punishment had a three-fold objective: reformation, deterrence and retribution. The rule of retribution -- a tooth for a tooth, an eye for an eye -- is increasingly considered uncivilised.

"Then is the case of reformation. If a person is eliminated where is the opportunity for reformation?" he said.

Experience and studies have proved that death punishment have not worked for deterrence too, Thomas said.

He recalled the experience of erstwhile princely states of Cochin and Travancore where death penalty was abolished in 1940 but restored when they became part of the Indian republic in 1950.

Records show that there were a higher number of murders in the 1950s than in the 1940s when there was no capital punishment. "So the theory of deterrence is not valid in many places and periods", he said.

He said the simple test for death sentence was visualising our own children in the situation. "Our children commit mistakes and we want to reform them through punishments. But do we want to kill them?"

In 1999, the three-member supreme court bench comprising Thomas, Justice D.P. Wadwah and Justice S.S.M .Quadri had awarded death punishment to Murugan, Santhan, Perarivalan and Murugan's wife Nalini in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.

Thomas had dissented on death punishment to Nalini while the other two judges were for capital punishment for all four.

Nalini's sentence was commuted to life imprisonment as President Pratibha Patil accepted her mercy petition. The petition was recommended by Rajiv's widow and Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

"I found Nalini was acting like a robot and did not know till the last hour that she was to kill Rajiv Gandhi at Sriperumbudur in Tamil Nadu on 21st May, 1991." Thomas said.

If both Murugan and Nalini were to be killed their child would have been an "orphan made by law", he added.

With the President rejecting the mercy petition of the trio, they were to be hanged September 8 this year. However, the Madras High Court September 1 stayed their execution for eight weeks. The Supreme Court will hear a plea to transfer the petition on October 19 .

"It was my misfortune to have presided over the bench which gave the death penalty to the four accused. But I had to discharge my duties," Thomas said about the 1999 verdict.

"The debate over the suitability and ethics of the death sentence is picking up in India," he said. The Supreme Court had deliberated the issue during the Bachan Singh case in 1983 and directed that death penalty should be awarded only in the 'rarest of the rare cases', he recalled.

Thomas, a practising Christian, had courted controversy recently when he said at a function in Kochi that the "smear campaign" that Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was responsible for the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi was "baseless". RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat was also present at the function.

An alumnus of the C.M.S. College, Kottayam, he has often criticized Christian educational institutions "indulging in commercial practises" and has suggested that minorities should give up the special rights given by the Constitution.

Source : http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/rajiv-gandhi-killing-death-sentence-judicial-murder/1/155142.html

Friday, October 14, 2011

US wanted Kasab's lawyer to build case for his freedom: WikiLeaks

Aman Sharma New Delhi, October 14, 2011 | UPDATED 10:15 IST

Lending a touch of irony, 26/ 11 terrorist Ajmal Kasab has approached the Supreme Court in appeal against his death sentence. But the plea he has made there, has been dismissed by his attorney S. G. Abbas Kazmi two years ago before the trial court pronounced its verdict.

Kasab has pleaded in the apex court that he was "brainwashed like a robot" into committing the dastardly act "in the name of god" and, "given my young age", had a chance to reform.

But a secret American diplomatic cable exposed by WikiLeaks shows that Kazmi had discounted exploring this avenue when the US had mentioned these very arguments to him in the trial court: if he would contact Kasab's parents in Pakistan to build up the case for mitigating circumstances which may help the convict escape the noose.

An official of the US embassy had met Kazmi on September 3, 2009, asking him if India would contact Kasab's parents in Pakistan to know the circumstances under which he was indoctrinated by the Lashkar e-Tayyeba (LeT) and whether he had been brainwashed. But Kazmi had dismissed the possibility of such a move, saying there were no funds to bring Kasab's parents to India and they would not get a visa.

"The death penalty is authorised in India only in rarest of the rare cases, Kazmi said, where there has been extreme brutality or inhuman treatment. The Indian law allows consideration of mitigating factors, such as whether Kasab had been brainwashed, but Kazmi is not planning on calling witnesses to testify on behalf of Kasab to explain the circumstances that led him to be indoctrinated by the LeT," the cable stated.

Kazmi ruled out calling anyone from Pakistan to testify on his behalf in the mitigation phase of the trial. Kazmi said: "I am an Indian citizen. I am not going to contact anyone in Pakistan." Even if he wanted to, there were no funds to bring such a witness to Mumbai, nor was it likely (that) the person would get a visa, he surmised. Further, he noted that no one from Kasab's family had contacted him, the cable added. Kasab's parents, Amir Shahban Kasab and Noor Illah, live in Faridkot village of Okara district. His family has rarely spoken up except when his father confirmed to Pakistani TV channels after 26/ 11 that Kasab was his son.

The US cable stated that even Kasab's defence lawyer was certain that the trial court would award him the death sentence.

"Kazmi said that given the overwhelming evidence against Kasab, he expected Kasab to be convicted and sentenced to death. Kasab's and Kazmi's fatalistic acceptance of the ultimate outcome of the trial appears to be shared by the public at large," the cable added.

Kazmi also complained to the US official that his attempts to provide Kasab with a "robust defence and fair trial" had been hampered from the beginning, the cable stated. "Kazmi is not permitted to confer with his client in private to prepare the defence.

Source: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/wikileaks-ajmal-kasab-us-26-11-mumbai-terrorist-attacks/1/154812.html

Accessed 14th October 2011

8 Indian prisoners on hunger strike in Lahore jail, seek early release

AMRITSAR: Perturbed over the unusual delay in their release, eight Indian prisoners have gone on fast in Kot Lakhpat jail, Lahore, Pakistan, demanding their immediate release.

Talking to TOI over phone from Lahore on Thursday, counsel for Indian death sentence awardees Sarabjit Singh (also lodged in Kot Lakhpat jail), Awais Sheikh said that Khakhi Hussain, Satinder Pal, Surjit Singh, Ram Rai, Waryam Khan, Om Parkash, Musallim Deenand and Nazir Hussani, all Indian nationals, have been sitting on a fast since October 5.

"Their jail sentences came to an end long ago but are yet to be released," he said. The jail authorities were yet to receive the identification papers of these prisoners from Indian high commission before they could start the repatriation process, he said, adding that he had visited the jail to meet the prisoners sitting on hunger strike.

He said he had sent the papers of agitating prisoners to Indian high commission for necessary action. "I have received identification papers of three prisoners while those of others were yet to be received" he said.

Awais suggested that Indian high commission should expedite the completion of identity verification process which includes verification by concerned police station in India where the prisoner had been living.

Meanwhile, Dalbir Kaur, sister of Sarabjit Singh, said that Kot Lakhpat jail authorities had banned meeting of any outsider or jail inmate with Sarabjit ever since her return from Pakistan on July 5. "Only once, Awais Sheikh had met him, who informed that Sarabjit had gone under depression," she said.

The Pakistan high court had also turned down the request of Awais Sheikh to teach yoga to his client in jail so that he could overcome depression and other physical ailments.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/8-Indian-prisoners-on-hunger-strike-in-Lahore-jail-seek-early-release/articleshow/10348597.cms
accessed on 14th October 2011
Yudhvir RanaYudhvir Rana, TNN | Oct 14, 2011, 06.21AM IST

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Bombay High Court to conduct 2003 blasts trial via video-conference

The Bombay High Court has become tech-savvy.

After the hearings on the confirmation of the death sentence for Pakistani terrorist Ajmal Kasab were conducted through video-conference — a first-of-its-kind arrangement made in the court to hear proceedings for security reasons, the HC will now conduct the death confirmation proceedings of the 2003 Gateway of India and Zaveri Bazaar blasts accused the same way.

A huge screen has been put up inside court room no 13, where Justice A M Khanwilkar and Justice P D Kode are presently hearing confirmation proceedings.

Officials involved in the setting up of the video link between the Arthur Road prison and the court said, “The link is being tested and will soon become operational. The court will conduct the proceedings through it.”

The reason for the shift is the huge cost being incurred and the heavy bandobast required to escort the three death row convicts to and from the court.

Two blasts at the Gateway of India and the Zaveri Bazaar had killed 52 people and injured more than 100 on August 25, 2003.
Five persons were arrested. Three — Fehmida, husband Hanif and Ashrat Ansari — were sentenced to death.

Source: http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report_bombay-high-court-to-conduct-2003-blasts-trial-via-video-conference_1598132
accessed on 14th October 2011

Published: Thursday, Oct 13, 2011, 8:00 IST
By DNA Correspondent | Place: Mumbai | Agency: DNA

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Dubai court awards death sentence to two Punjabis

Times of India
I P Singh, TNN Oct 11, 2011, 11.49AM IST

JALANDHAR: An appellate court of Dubai has not only confirmed the death sentence of an already convicted Punjabi man in the case of murder of two men from Kerala in 2009 but also awarded capital punishment to another Punjabi, who was earlier awarded life imprisonment by the trial court.

Ten other accused in the case - nine Punjabis and a Pakistani - have been sentenced to jail. The trial court had earlier awarded death sentence to Major Singh of Gurdaspur but the appellate court in its order on Monday also awarded capital punishment to Amarjit Singh of Batala.

Sentence of two convicts - Surinder Singh and Balwinder Singh - has been reduced from life term to 15 years, while the rest would face life term.

Dubai-based hotelier S P Singh Oberoi said that they had already engaged a lawyer to contest the case in Supreme Court. He said that he had been trying to locate the families of the two deceased men from Kerala, to reach a compromise, but had succeeded in his efforts. He added that they had requested the court that they be allowed to deposit blood money till the time the victims' families were found.

Two men from Kerala were killed in Dubai on January 1, 2009. Out of the 12 Punjabis accused of their murder, nine were convicted and sentenced in January last in a separate case of murder of another man from Kerala. Oberoi said that family of this man from Kerala could also not be found. The charges against them included intentional murder, bootlegging, consuming liquor and hiding evidence by concealing the body.

Source: http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-10-11/chandigarh/30266120_1_punjabis-death-sentence-life-term

accessed on 12th October 2011

Kashmiri on Death Row Galvanises Opposition to Death Penalty

By Sana Altaf

SRINAGAR, India, Oct 10, 2011 (IPS) - "Is Afzal Guru really the person that so many Indians supposedly want dead? Or are they taking out their frustrations on an easy target?" asked Human Rights Watch, referring to the death sentence handed down to the Kashmiri man who was convicted of conspiracy in the 2001 suicide attack on the Indian Parliament.

"For many, Afzal bears the burden of representing all those who dare to oppose Indian rule in restive parts of the country, because the attack on Parliament was an attack on India," said the statement by Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia researcher for global rights watchdog HRW.

"Conversely, many Kashmiris would say that Afzal is a freedom fighter, planning an attempt at the symbol of Indian oppression," adds the statement, titled ‘Life, Not Death: Why Afzal Mustn’t Hang’. "Both views are flawed. For this multi-religious, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural state to survive, Indians have to believe in equal justice for all. And in the case of Jammu and Kashmir, there has been consistent failure to deliver on this promise."

A Kashmiri, supported by a wife who is a doctor and a lone teenage son, Mohammad Afzal, commonly called Afzal Guru, was found guilty of conspiracy in the attack on parliament which killed more than a dozen people. He was given the death penalty, which was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2004.

The sentence was to be carried out in 2006, but the execution was stayed following a mercy plea filed by Afzal Guru.

Although most nations across the globe – a total of 139 – have abolished the death penalty, India continues the practice, as the World Day Against the Death Penalty once again rolled around on Oct. 10.

India joined 53 other countries to vote against the December 2007 United Nations General Assembly moratorium on executions, passed with 104 votes in favour and 29 abstentions. However, Indian judges generally follow the 1983 Supreme Court ruling that the death penalty may be resorted to only in the "rarest of rare cases".

Afzal’s death penalty has not gone down well amongst various quarters in Kashmir. The separatist leaders view it as an unjust step, which would endanger the political situation in Kashmir

"I am completely against execution of Afzal Guru. He didn’t get a fair trial. Hanging him would be pure human rights violation," said Shabir Ahmad Shah, the chairman of the Democratic Freedom Party, a separatist organisation.

He says that Afzal’s hanging could have a negative impact on the situation in Kashmir. "When Maqbool Bhat was hanged in India’s Tihar jail in 1984, it was followed by insurgency. And if Afzal is also hanged, it will as well result in dangerous consequences," Shabir told IPS. "People would surely come on streets and protest against it as no Kashmiri wants his hanging."

The unrest in Kashmir has its roots back in 1947, when Britain granted India independence and the Muslim-dominated areas became part of Pakistan. A U.N. resolution, meantime, gave Kashmiris the option to join either Hindu-dominated India or Pakistan or to become independent. But Kashmiris had no chance to make a choice as their homeland is claimed by both India and Pakistan.

Roughly a third of modern-day Kashmir is administered by Pakistan while the rest is under India. But many Kashmiris challenge this, and protesters living on the Indian side rose up in arms in 1989 in an insurgency that simmers to this day.

Saying Afzal did not get a fair trial, Sajjad Lone, another separatist leader, said intellectuals, NGOs and civil society in general needs to stand up against Afzal’s execution, which he said "will not suit the people of Kashmir."

Hardline separatist leader of Kashmir Syed Ali Shah Geelani warned of "dire consequences" if Afzal Guru is hanged, saying in a statement in August that "it will unleash a storm."

Human rights activists and organisations have also criticised Afzal's death sentence, which they see as a human rights abuse.

"Afzal Guru's case is being adjudicated upon in terms of its politics, not in relation to the violations of process and hearing that have taken place. The death penalty has no place in a democracy," said Angana Chatterji, a professor of social and cultural anthropology at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco, and the co-convener of the International People's Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Kashmir.

Chatterji says despite the international movement to abolish capital punishment and the 2007 U.N. moratorium on executions, "India continues to impose the (death) penalty. The allocation of capital punishment continues to be influenced by racism, ethnocentrism, and class prejudice, authorising the state to act against a person's right to life."

Kashmir-based human rights activist Khurram Parvez, a co-founder of the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), says the sentence handed down to Afzal was not based on a fair trial.

"If anyone reads that judgment, one would come to know that he was pronounced guilty on secondary evidence. No direct evidence was produced in the court against Afzal Guru," Parvez told IPS.

Citing the Supreme Court sentence, he said it states that "the incident, which resulted in heavy casualties, has shaken the entire nation and the collective conscience of society will only be satisfied if capital punishment is awarded to the offender."

"When there is no evidence against Afzal, why should he be hanged? To satisfy the collective conscience of society, it appears India needs a sacrifice," Parvez added.

Advocate Faisal Qadri said the death penalty should be abolished in India. "I am completely against the death penalty. It is the worst kind of human rights violation. Humans have no right to kill anyone, even if it is a criminal."

And Qadri argued that in Afzal Guru’s case, capital punishment is completely unjustified: "Even India’s own leading lawyers admit that Afzal was not given a fair trial."

For ordinary people, the sentence handed to Afzal is a manifestation of India’s bias against Kashmiris.

"The Indian system is biased against Kashmiri people…there are scores of innocent Kashmiri youth who are arrested on the basis of mere suspicion and put behind bars for years with no evidence. How can we expect India to be just to Afzal?" said Iqbal (who provided only one name).

"Whenever any Kashmiri is found involved in any wrong act, India has to act in an unjust manner. That has been India's policy towards Kashmir," says Amina Maqbool, a political science student from the University of Kashmir

The HRW statement says the group "unequivocally opposes the death penalty. Guilty or not, we believe that neither Mohammad Afzal Guru, nor (law student) Priyadarshini Mattoo’s killer, Santosh Kumar Singh, nor (former Iraqi president) Saddam Hussein, nor anyone else, should be executed.

"Taking the life of a human being is inherently cruel, and as a form of punishment is unique in its irreversibility. The intrinsic fallibility of all criminal justice systems assures that even when there is a fair judicial process, innocent persons will still be executed. On a practical level, there is no evidence that it is an effective deterrent," it adds. (END)

Source: http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=105411
Accessed on 12th October 2011

A matter of life and death

By Kuldip Nayar
Published: October 10, 2011
The Express Tribune: With the International Herald Tribune


I have no personal differences with people who want to abolish capital punishment. It is their principled stand, as they claim, and it holds good in all cases where death sentences have been awarded. The risk of hanging an innocent person is too great, they say. Not even the state has the right to end a life which is given by God. The rationale of nearly 150 countries is more or less the same and they have taken away from their courts the power to award death sentences, however heinous the crime maybe.

India and the US are also under pressure from human rights organisations to change their archaic laws and ban the death sentence. My own belief is that the death sentence is barbaric and it needs to be abolished. It reminds me of the days when the dictum of tooth for tooth prevailed. Our government is still stuck on the idea that death sentence acts as a deterrent or that it assuages the grief of those who lose their dear ones.

I am bewildered at the attitude of the leaders and activists who ask for clemency on behalf of the culprits, who should have been hanged long ago.

This faulty thinking first made the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, J Jayalalithaa, ask for clemency of three convicts of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination. Now, Punjab Chief Minister Prakash Singh Badal has asked mercy for DP Singh Bhuller who triggered a bomb blast in September 1993, which killed nine people.

And the latest in line is the chief minister of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK), Omar Abdullah, who had raised the question of whether the resolution for clemency of Afzal Guru by his state assembly would go unnoticed, as was the Tamil Nadu assembly’s resolution. Afzal Guru was sentenced to death for having attacked the parliament, which is the symbol of India’s democratic polity. All three chief ministers have politicised criminal acts. They have never demanded the abolition of the death penalty. The cases they espouse and believe, give them electoral advantage. Since politicians weigh everything on the scales of vote, they do not mind preaching something against the constitution.

Or, is it possible that they are afraid to take a stand on the basic issue and prefer to go along wherever the wind blows at a particular time? The raucous created in the Tamil Nadu assembly has been copied by the AJK assembly, beating all records. In both the cases, the ruling parties have been in the forefront in fomenting trouble.

The Supreme Court’s remark holds well in all the three cases. Taking up the mercy petition filed by Bhullar, the court has asked the government to explain the delay. After a lapse of eight years, the president who disposes mercy petitions rejected the plea on May 25 this year. All countries in South Asia have jumped into the arena. Sarabjeet Singh must languish in a Pakistani jail because he is the prize which Islamabad wants to cash in on some day to extract concession from New Delhi. Likewise, India must have a hostage in the shape of one prisoner or another from Pakistan.

There is no other way except to go back to what the law demands. Yet, I believe that there should be no hanging of Afzal Guru, D P Singh Bhuller, Sarabjeet Singh and the Rajiv Gandhi assassins. Their death sentences should be commuted to life imprisonment. And life sentence should mean sentence for life, till the culprit breathes his last in jail.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 11th, 2011.

Source: http://tribune.com.pk/story/271019/a-matter-of-life-and-death/
accessed on 12th October 2011

Monday, October 10, 2011

Rajiv assassins' plea should not be moved out of Tamil Nadu: Govt

New Delhi: The Tamil Nadu government today opposed in the Supreme Court a plea to shift out of the Madras High Court the appeals of three Rajiv Gandhi assassins, challenging their death penalty on account of an 11-year delay in deciding their mercy petition by the President.

Tamil Nadu's Additional Advocate General Gurukrishna Kumar opposed the plea for transfer of the three convicts' appeals out of the state High Court, denying allegations made before the apex court that the atmosphere in the state was too "vitiated and surcharged" to hold a free and fair hearing in the case.

Kumar also questioned the locus standi of petitioner L K Venkat, seeking the apex court's direction for transfer of the case out of Madras High Court to the Supreme Court.

Senior counsel Ram Jethmalani, appearing for the three convicts on death row, also opposed the transfer plea on the ground that Article 139A (relating to transfer of certain cases) gives power only to the Attorney General of India or the aggrieved parties to file a petition for transfer.


Venkat's counsel L Nandkumar, however, submitted that a free and fair hearing of the proceedings cannot be held in the Madras High Court owing to the "surcharged, hostile and vitiated" atmosphere prevailing there.

After hearing the arguments by various parties, a bench of justices G S Signhvi and S J Mukhopadhaya asked the state to file a counter affidavit within a week and posted the matter for further hearing to October 19.

The bench asked Tamil Nadu government to file a counter affidavit on the plea for shifting appeals of the three condemned prisoners in the assassination case out of the state high court.

"Though the request made by the state additional advocate general is unreasonable, we are granting time for filing the counter affidavit," the bench said.

The judges were irked at Tamil Nadu government's request as it had failed to reply till date to its September 15 notice on plea.

On a petition by the three death row convicts, the Madras High Court had earlier stayed their hanging and had issued notices to the Centre and the Tamil Nadu government.

The three convicts - Santhan, Murugan and Perarivalan alias Arivu - had challenged the sentence despite the same having been upheld earlier by the apex court and the President having rejected their mercy pleas subsequently.

Venkat subsequently had moved the apex court seeking transfer of their appeals out of the state high court and the apex court had issued notices on the petition to the state.

Venkat had alleged in his plea that the convicts' appeals challenging their death sentences cannot be heard in a free and fair atmosphere in the state as several supporters of the banned LLTE were interfering with the functioning of the judiciary by raising slogans in support of the convicts.



Source : http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/rajiv-assassins-plea-should-not-be-moved-out-of-tamil-nadu-govt-139995

EU outlines death penalty policy

In a statement on the occasion of World and European Day against the Death Penalty, which is being observed today, the European Union has expressed the hope that Trinidad and Tobago will “soon choose to leave the minority group of countries that still retain the death penalty”. The EU stated: “After three decades of steady progress, more than two-thirds of the countries in the world have abolished the death penalty. The EU is leading the efforts to achieve universal abolition of the death penalty. “We welcome the UN’s recent resolutions on the global moratorium on the use of the death penalty, with a view to its complete abolition, supported by a wide coalition of States from all regions of the world.

“The growing support granted to UN resolutions on this matter in 2007, 2008 and 2010 confirms an increasing international trend against the death penalty. “At the same time, while we acknowledge the growing number of countries which have done away with the death penalty (the figure grew from 55 to 97, between 1993 and 2009), we cannot ignore the fact that 58 countries in the world still retain the death penalty. “The EU considers the death penalty to be a cruel and inhuman punishment, which represents an unacceptable denial of human dignity and integrity. It only serves to aggravate a culture of violence and retribution.

“In its efforts against the death penalty, the EU is actively supported by states from all regions of the world. The EU encourages public debate, strengthening public opposition and putting pressure on retentionist countries to abolish the death penalty, or at least introduce a moratorium as a first step. “The EU also acts against the death penalty in multilateral fora such as the United Nations; a culmination of this effort was the resolution on the moratorium on the use of the death penalty, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 18, 2007.” The UN General Assembly adopted in 2008, non-binding resolutions calling for a global moratorium on executions, with a view to eventual abolition.

The vote on the non-binding resolution was 54 against, 29 abstentions and 104 in favour. “At present there is a worldwide trend towards abolition of the death penalty. Around 139 countries have abolished the death penalty by law or practice.” Although many nations have abolished capital punishment, Wikipedia estimates that more than 60 per cent of the world’s population live in countries where executions take place. Among the countries that retain capital punishment are the United States of America, China, India and Indonesia—the four most populous nations in the world. Capital punishment is also legal in Israel, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia. The execution of prisoners found guilty of capital crimes in T&T is still the law of the land, despite efforts by anti-capital punishment campaigners to lobby the Government to change the law.

source: http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/2011/10/10/eu-outlines-death-penalty-policy
accessed on 10th October 2011

Abolish death penalty, EU tells India

Death sentences for many Indian fugitives hang in balance as EU supports abolition of death penalty

Iftikhar Gilani
New Delhi

The issues of the execution of Devender Pal Singh Bhullar and charging Abu Salem, a close associate of international fugitive Dawood Ibrahim, under clauses demanding death sentence are set to create a diplomatic row between India and Europe. The European Union, on Monday, declared abolition of the death penalty the world over as one of their human rights and foreign policy objectives to mark 10 October as the World and European Day against the Death Penalty.

In a joint declaration by Catherine Ashton, European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, reaffirmed united opposition to the death penalty, and committed to work for its worldwide abolition.

“We consider capital punishment to be inhumane, and a violation of human dignity. Experience in Europe has taught us that the death penalty does not prevent an increase in violent crime, and nor does it bring justice to the victims of such crimes. Any capital punishment resulting from a miscarriage of justice, from which no legal system can be immune, represents irreversible loss of human life,” said the declaration.

Earlier, in a letter to the Union Home Minister P Chidambaram, Ashton had made it clear that the grouping opposes death sentence pronounced to Prof. Devender Pal Singh Bhullar, a Khalistani militant. Bhullar is facing the gallows after President Pratibha Patil rejected his petition of mercy.

Bhullar was deported from Germany on 18 January, 1995, after his application seeking political asylum was rejected by German authorities. The decision to deport him was declared illegal by a Frankfurt court two years later. Bhullar was then arrested by Delhi Police at the airport on charges of falsification of documents. However, he was later handed over to the Punjab Police, who booked him under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act, for engineering bomb blasts at the Youth Congress office in Delhi and elsewhere in Punjab.

Outgoing German ambassador to India Thomas Matussek believed that Germany wouldn’t have deported him, knowing the fate of his case. He said Bhullar’s deportation came as he had not disclosed full fact before German authorities and the court there. “Unfortunately for him and for us, he presented a forged passport and gave totally wrong story. When that was put to court it was clear there was no basis for his asylum and court ruled he could be deported,” he said. “Later on, a real story came out. He hadn’t told us,” the ambassador added. Matussek made it clear that in a similar case in future, the person would not be deported. If this case comes up in Germany now and he tells the full story, we will not deport him,” he maintained.

In the case of Abu Salem, the Portugal High Court has cancelled the extradition order of 2005 under which the gangster was handed to Indian authorities and was brought to India. The High Court had cancelled the extradition order on grounds that the terms and conditions of extradition were violated by Indian authorities.

As per the extradition order, he shall not be given the death sentence and not be put to trial for the offences other than mentioned in the extradition order and not be given a sentence of 25 years. The CBI has already filed an appeal at the Supreme Court in Lisbon, contending that India has strictly adhered to the terms and conditions of the extradition order.

The declaration also called for full implementation of a recent UN resolution, which called for global moratorium on the use of the death penalty, with a view to its complete abolition. The EU is also the first regional body to have adopted rules prohibiting the trade in goods used for capital punishment (and torture and ill-treatment), as well as the supply of technical assistance related to such goods. The EU’s political commitment has been matched by substantial financial support for concrete projects.

Iftikhar Gilani is Special Correspondent with Tehelka.com.
iftikhar@tehelka.com

Source: http://www.tehelka.com/story_main50.asp?filename=Ws101011World.asp
accessed on 10th October 2011

Back from the brink

Chennai:
One morning four decades ago, Thiagu killed a man. It was neither a mistake nor an accident. He and his associates planned carefully, made a failed attempt a few months earlier and finally managed to murder a landlord on that morning of September way back in 1970, hacking him to death on the spot. In an era where the attempt was to overthrow “casteist” and “classist” rulers, that killing was to herald ‘Spring Thunder’ in Tamil Nadu.
K Thiagarajan alias Thiagu was then a young man of 20, when he read Naxal leader Charu Mazumdar’s revolutionary exhortation ‘To the Youth and the Students’. The impact it had on the young man’s mind was such that he left his studies the next day and moved to villages to be among the peasants and working class, toiling among then even while educating and preparing the masses for the revolution that he then believed was imminent and inevitable. Change was the goal, armed uprising was the means and violence was but a justifiable path for the greater common good.
“The idea we had then was that if we kill a few landlords who oppressed the poor and attack the police who always sided with the rich, we would be able to create a revolutionary base in Thanjavur first and take the struggle forward from there. Though the means were violent, the objective was a just one,” recalled Thiagu.
The target was Muthu Thangappa, a 40-something landlord, at Thiruvonam village in Thanjavur district. Thangappa, a former panchayat president, was not a big landlord, but was allegedly casteist; one who they believed had murdered many poor peasants.
At around 7 a.m. on September 27, 1970, as Thangappa washed himself in the village pond and was to proceed to drink arrack as was his routine, a squad of five hacked him and assaulted another who tried to stop the attack.
Though the squad members dispersed from the scene immediately, Thiagu, who was new to the area, was caught within a few hours. Some of his accomplices, too, were soon in police custody. The group tried to attempt an escape by attacking the police party that took them to the Thanjavur sessions court for trial, but failed.
During the trial, the accused refused to cooperate with the hearing, maintaining that the “bourgeois” court cannot judge their actions. Instead, while the trial was going on, they shouted slogans, sang revolutionary songs and staged plays about a classless society. Without an advocate to argue their case, the verdict went against them—Lenin Rangasamy and Gurumurthy were awarded death penalty and the rest, including Thiagu, got life imprisonment.
When the case came to the High Court for confirmation, a few lawyers appealed against the sessions court verdict. “Though we refused to appeal, continuing our boycott of the proceedings, the case automatically came to the High Court for reference trial as is mandatory for all cases where the verdict is capital punishment. I wrote to senior lawyer Krishnamurthi stating that we don’t want to appeal to which he replied, ‘We will save you in spite of you’,” says Thiagu.
In the reference trial, the higher court observed that despite the insistence of the accused to boycott the proceedings, the trial court erred in not appointing a lawyer or at least cross-examining the witnesses, leading to a procedural flaw and ordered a retrial, this time at the Nagapattinam sessions court.
That court not only confirmed death for Lenin and Gurumurthy, it also turned Thiagu’s life imprisonment to death penalty in the verdict passed on July 7, 1972. The three death penalties were subsequently confirmed by the High Court in October.
Waiting for death inside the prison, they read a lot and discussed all that they read, which gradually changed their outlook towards the path they had undertaken even as they stood by the aim. This led Thiagu to disown killings as the means to overthrow the system.
“When I looked back and re-examined the whole process and ideas, I realised that however noble the goal, the means we adopted were not the best. When the landlord was murdered, the lower castes distributed sweets and when we were awarded death, the caste Hindus did the same. We were not able to overcome these biases,” says Thiagu.
Even though the trio didn’t want to seek mercy, an activist, A G Kasturirangan, popularly known as AGK, drafted a petition on their behalf in 1973 in which he referred to a similar case in Kerala where one Mundur Ravunni was let off the gallows as the person he was accused of killing was a cruel landlord. The next year, on April 10, 1973, Thiagu, Lenin and Gurumurthi had their death penalty reduced to life imprisonment by the then Chief Minister M Karunanidhi.
During his time in prison, Thiagu read and reread, discussed and debated about the world, life and politics. He translated Karl Marx’s Capital for the first time in Tamil, ran a handwritten paper inside the prison called Swatanthiradaham (Thirst for Freedom) and fought for the welfare of prisoners through the Organisation for the Rights of the Imprisoned. “For us, prison was just a venue, a platform where you stage the struggle. We educated many, made them aware and started discussing public issues,” he says.
On November 29, 1985, Thiagu and the other two were released from prison after the authorities confirmed that they were no longer a threat to the society.
After his release, Thiagu immersed himself in finishing his work on translating Capital, which he eventually completed seven years after his release from the erstwhile Chennai central prison. Politically, he moved from Maoism to Indian mainstream Communism, though not for long. By then he was attracted to Tamil nationalism that was not acceptable to the Left and he was expelled from the party.
Around this time, Thiagu started a school, Thai Tamil Primary School, outside Chennai which focussed on educating underprivileged children. The idea was to educate children so as to equip them to be constructive elements with the larger goal of a casteless, classless society. Twenty years hence, the school has nine teachers for 150 students, running classes from KG to class 8.
He is now the president of Tamilar Desiya Viduthalai Iyakkam, a forum that advocates independence of Tamil Nadu through a political process. He writes extensively on most social matters, especially Tamil nationalism, Sri Lankan Tamils and abolition of death penalty. He is among the prominent speakers in Tamil Nadu on any of these subjects.

Source: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/back-from-the-brink/857448/
accessed on 10th October 2011

Burning family alive rarest of rare crime, rules SC

NEW DELHI: Upholding death penalty to a man guilty of burning alive his wife and three children, the Supreme Court on Tuesday said the crime fell in the rarest of rare category and that the accused could not be "reformed or rehabilitated".

The case pertained to Ajitsingh Harnamsingh Gujral of Mumbai, who, after a fight with his wife on the night of April 9-10, 2003, poured gallons of petrol on her and the children, set them on fire and fled. Four days later, he was caught in Madanganj in Ajmer district, Rajasthan.

Discussing a whole gamut of Supreme Court judgments dealing with death penalty and laying down the rarest of rare category guidelines, Justice Katju said: "In our opinion this is one of such cases. Burning living persons to death is a horrible act which causes excruciating pain to the victim, and this could not have been unknown to Gujral."

"A person like Gujral who instead of doing his duty of protecting his family kills them in such a cruel and barbaric manner cannot be reformed or rehabilitated. The balance sheet is heavily against him and accordingly we uphold the death sentence awarded to him," the bench said.

The apex court also examined the trend of death penalty worldwide and noted the divergence — 96 countries have abolished it, 34 have not used it for a considerable period of time while 58 countries still retain it.

Among the European countries, Italy abolished death penalty in 1947, followed by Germany (1949), UK (1973) and France (1981). Canada did it in 1976 and Russia has not imposed death penalty on anyone since 1996. Australia last did in 1967 before formally abolishing it in 2010.

Quoting Amnesty International data, Justice Katju said: "China executes more people than all the rest of the world put together. It has death penalty for a variety of crimes — aggravated murder, drug trafficking, large scale corruption etc."

He said the UN General Assembly in 2007-08 passed a nonbinding resolution for global moratorium of execution with a view to eventually abolishing it. "However, 65% of the world population lives in countries like China, India, Indonesia and the US which continue to apply death penalty, although both India and Indonesia use it rarely," the bench said.

In the Indian context, the bench said only the legislature could abolish death penalty and not the courts. "As long as the death penalty exists in the statute book it has to be imposed in some cases, otherwise it will tantamount to repeal of the death penalty by judiciary," it said.

Source: http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-09-14/india/30153982_1_death-penalty-rare-category-justice-katju
accessed on 10th October 2011

SC stays Ajmal Kasab’s death verdict

NEW DELHI - Supreme Court has stayed death sentence of 26/11 Mumbai terror attack convict Ajmal Kasab. The Supreme Court today heard the plea of the Pakistani terrorist challenging his conviction and death sentence in the 26/11 Mumbai attacks case. Kasab, the sole convict in the case, has filed the petition through jail authorities in the apex court which had appointed senior advocate Raju Ramachandaran as amicus curie to assist it in deciding the appeal.

On September 2, the apex court had agreed to hear the plea of Maharashtra government against the acquittal of two accused Faheem Ansari and Sabauddin Ahmed in the 26/11 case. It, however, had refused to pass any order on Kasab when the state government pleaded that his letter to the Supreme Court challenging his death sentence should be tagged with this appeal. The Bombay High Court had in its February 21 verdict upheld the trial court order awarding death sentence to Kasab for the "brutal and diabolical" attacks aimed at "destabilising" the government.

Source: http://www.newzfirst.com/web/guest/full-story/-/asset_publisher/Qd8l/content/sc-stays-ajmal-kasab%E2%80%99s-death-verdict?redirect=%2Fweb%2Fguest%2Fhome
accessed on 10th October 2011