Death penalty exception, life term is rule, says SC

J VENKATESAN

Published : Mar 21, 2019, 1:52 am IST

The death sentence must be imposed only when life imprisonment appears to be an altogether inappropriate punishment.

Supreme Court

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has held that life imprisonment is the rule, to which the death penalty is the exception. The death sentence must be imposed only when life imprisonment appears to be an altogether inappropriate punishment, having regard to the relevant facts and circumstances of the crime.

The apex court in a recent judgment said sentencing is a difficult task and often vexes the mind of the court, but where the option is between life imprisonment and a death sentence, if the court itself feels some difficulty in awarding one or the other, it is only appropriate that the lesser punishment be awarded.

A bench of Justices N.V. Ramana, M. Shantanagouder and Indira Banerjee said the courts are not obliged to make efforts either to give latitude to the prosecution or loosely construe the law in favour of the accused. The traditional dogmatic hyper technical approach has to be replaced by a rational, realistic and genuine approach for administering justice in a criminal trial. If a court finds it difficult to make a choice between death penalty and life imprisonment, it should opt for the lesser punishment.

In this case the appellant Sachin Kumar Singhraha was sentenced to death for the rape and murder of a five-year-old girl in Madhya Pradesh. He took the child to the school where his own daughter was studying, but the victim did not return home that day. He raped and killed her and dumped the body in a well. Both the trial and high courts slapped death sentence on him and he preferred the present appeal.

Disposing of the appeal, the Bench in its verdict said “he has committed a heinous offence in a premeditated manner. He not only abused the faith reposed in him by the parents but also exploited the innocence and helplessness of a child as young as five years of age. At the same time, we are not convinced that the probability of reform of the accused/appellant is low, in the absence of prior offending history and keeping in mind his overall conduct.”

Source: https://www.asianage.com/india/all-india/210319/death-penalty-exception-life-term-is-rule-says-sc.html (accessed on 29 May 2019)

Beant Singh assassination case: Jagtar Singh Tara gets life imprisonment (Punjab)

By Express Web Desk |New Delhi |Updated: March 17, 2018 5:55:01 pm

Beant Singh assassination case: Confessing his crime in January, Jagtar Singh Tara had submitted a letter to the court stating, “I have no regret for killing Beant Singh”. 

Jagtar Singh

A day after pronouncing Jagtar Singh Tara guilty in the case of assassination of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh, the district court of Chandigarh on Saturday sentenced him to life imprisonment. “The Court has passed the order for life imprisonment for him,” Tara’s lawyer said. Chief Secretary of Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, Roop Singh said, “Jagtar Singh Tara murdered Beant Singh out of emotions and not due to land or property dispute. Murdering someone is bad but he has been given punishment after 22 years. It’s painful for family as well as for the Sikh community.” Confessing his crime in January, Tara had submitted a letter to the court stating, “I have no regret for killing Beant Singh”. He had also said that Shaheed Udham Singh, who assassinated Michael O’Dwyer, was his inspiration to kill Beant. He also admitted that he purchased the car used for the assassination of Beant and they all waited for the best opportunity to kill the former CM.

As per the defence counsel, in the letter, Tara had stated that he took inspiration from Sikh history and tradition, which taught him not to bear injustice, and the circumstances at that time were intolerable when innocent Sikh youths were being brutally murdered. Earlier, Balwant Singh Rajoana was also convicted in the assasination case. The Chandigarh police had arrested nine persons for the assassination of Beant Singh while six others booked in the case were later declared proclaimed offenders by the court. Beant was killed in a bomb blast outside Punjab and Haryana secretariat on August 31, 1995. The explosion had killed 17 others, including Punjab Police constable Dilawar Singh, who acted as a human bomb. Tara was charged under sections 302 (murder), 307 (attempt to murder), 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code and under Sections 3 and 4 of the Explosive Substances Act.

The trial began in the district court in 1995. However, in 2004, Jagtar Singh Tara, Jagtar Singh Hawara and Paramjeet Singh Bheora escaped from the high-security Burail Model Jail in Chandigarh after digging a tunnel. In 2006, Jagtar Singh Hawara was arrested by the Punjab Police from Patiala. Among those convicted, Jagtar Singh Hawara and Balwant Singh Rajoana were sentenced to death. However, Hawara appealed in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which commuted his sentence to life imprisonment. Currently, he is lodged in Tihar jail in Delhi. Rajoana, who did not appeal against the death sentence, is currently in Patiala jail. Among the other convicts, Shamsher Singh, Gurmeet Singh and Lakhwinder Singh were sentenced to life imprisonment and Naseeb Singh was sentenced 10 years of imprisonment.

Source: https://indianexpress.com/article/india/beant-singh-assassination-case-jagtar-singh-tara-gets-life-imprisonment-5101201/ (Accessed 24 December 2018)

Serial Killer, ‘Cyanide’ Mohan Kumar Who Killed Scores of Women Gets Life Sentence in a Case of Rape and Murder. (Karnataka)

Abhishek Yadav Feb 26, 2018 10:47 AM IST 

Mangaluru, February 26: The Sixth Additional District and Sessions Court convicted a former teacher from Karnataka, Mohan Kumar, in a murder case of a 28-year-old woman of Maladi in Bantwal Taluk. This is the fifth case of conviction out of the 20 cases of murder registered against him.

Mohan Kumar aka Cyanide Mohan

Puttur additional superintendent of police Chandragupta had led his team and arrested the accused on September 21, 2010. The team had also filed a charge- sheet at the court. On Friday, 23 February 2018, the Sixth Additional District Sessions Court in Mangaluru convicted ‘Cyanide’ Mohan on the charges of murder, robbery and rape of a 28-year-old woman. He was given life imprisonment for the heinous act. Mohan Kumar, was termed as ‘Cyanide’ Kumar after cases of him sweet talking girls into a relationship with him and then killing them giving cyanide pills on the pretext of contraceptive came to the public light. Mohan would also do away with the jewellery of these victims. ‘Cyanide’ Mohan was also handed a death sentence by Mangaluru court in the year 2013.

In this case, according to the charge-sheet filed, Mohan got in touch with the victim in September 2009, at the bus stop in Madanthyar and introduced himself as Shashidhar Poojary. He got the woman’s mobile number and after courting her briefly, asked her to marry him. On September 24, he took the victim to a lodge and had sex with her. The next day, he told the victim that she should take a pill for avoiding getting pregnant and asked her to accompany him in a puja the next day. Manoj had already told the victim to get as much jewellery she had to wear it for the puja but told her to leave it in the lodge room as it was not required. He asked her to take the pill in the washroom and the victim died immediately after taking the pill. Mohan then ran away with all the jewellery and mobile phone. After reaching Mangaluru, Mohan sold the valuables at a jewellery shop located on KS Rao Road.

Mohan was convicted under Indian Penal Code Sections 302 (Murder), 366 (Kidnapping, abducting or inducing woman to compel her into marriage), 376 (Rape), 417 (Cheating), 328 (causing hurt by means of poison), 392 (robbery) and 201 (destruction of evidence). Judith O M Crasta, special public prosecutor, said that a total of 39 witnesses, 43 documents and 48 objects were examined and produced in the court. The Sixth Additional District and Sessions Judge D T Puttarangaswamy heard and upheld the arguments of Crasta’s arguments and convicted Mohan Kumar.

Source: https://www.latestly.com/india/information/karnataka-serial-killer-cyanide-mohan-kumar-who-killed-scores-of-women-gets-life-sentence-in-a-case-of-rape-and-murder-44557.html (Accessed 24 December 2018)

Ahmedabad: High court commutes death sentence to life term

TNN | Apr 14, 2015, 04.06AM IST

AHMEDABAD: Gujarat high court has commuted the death sentence of a convict to life imprisonment in a case of kidnapping and murder of a 9-year-old in Navsari.

Parvez Rana (38) was awarded death penalty in 2012 by a trial court in Navsari district for murdering the boy for a ransom of Rs 50 lakh. The murder took place in 2007.

On January 4, 2007, Nayan Kachrola, son of a diamond polishing unit employee, was kidnapped from outside his school in Navsari. The kidnapper called the boy's father, Hasmukh, and demanded a ransom of Rs 50 lakh. Police were informed about the incident and the boy's father began arranging for the ransom amount.

A day later, the police recovered the kid's body in a plastic bag from a rivulet. Rana was arrested and he confessed to the crime.

Rana told police that he had kidnapped Nayan to make some quick money. He told the police that he had kept Nayan in a plastic bag and left it at his shop. He kept a watch on police movement from his shop and fearing arrest decided to kill the child. He strangled the child and threw the body in a rivulet.

Rana had challenged the death penalty in the high court. The bench of Justice Akil Kureshi and Justice V M Pancholi concluded that the case did not fall under the rarest of the rare category and reduced the punishment to life imprisonment, said Rana's lawyer Pratik Barot.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/High-court-commutes-death-sentence-to-life-term/articleshow/46914018.cms [last accessed 28.05.2015]

President Pranab Mukherjee commutes death penalty of Assam man

Ten years after a man was awarded death sentence for killing his wife, two minor sons and a neighbourhood woman in upper Assam, President Pranab Mukherjee has commuted his death sentence to life imprisonment. This is a rare case where the President has accepted the mercy petition of a person convicted for gruesome murders. Earlier, Mukherjee had rejected mercy petitions of 22 death row convicts at a stretch. Man Bahadur Dewan alias Tote Dewan, now 63-years-old and lodged in Jorhat Central Jail, rarely had a visitor all these years as his surviving son and daughter had shunned him after the crime.

According to the prosecution, Dewan, a resident of Sessapukhuri Nepali basti under Moranhat police station in Sivasagar district, nearly 420 km east of Guwahati, had picked up a quarrel with his wife Gouri (35) on September 29, 2002. That night, though the quarrel came to an end with his wife preferring to remain silent, Dewan remained restless, until he woke up around 4 am, picked up a dao (machete), and hacked her to death. He then also hacked his two sons Rajib (10) and Kajib (who was just about eight months old) and started looking for his another son Raju and daughter Jyotimaya.

Raju and Jyotimaya, however, had already run away the previous night on seeing their father getting violent during the quarrel, and were sleeping in the house of a relative. Dewan, who came out of the house with the dao first knocked at the door of Prasad Dewan and Bijoy Dewan, but as the two did not open the door, he proceeded to the next house which belonged to one Raj Kumar Dewan. There he found Raj Kumar’s 60-year-old mother Bidhimaya in the compound, and even without uttering a word simply inflicted two blows with the dao on her neck.

Dewan then returned to his house, picked up the severed head of son Rajib, put it in a plastic bag and proceeded to Moranhat police station where he surrendered. While Dewan was awarded death sentence by the then Sivasagar Sessions Judge B D Agarwal on December 26, 2003. Later the Gauhati High Court and the Supreme Court rejected appeals against death sentence. He then filed a mercy plea before the Assam governor on September 2, 2005, who rejected it on December 23, 2013. He then sent the plea to the President on February 10, 2014.

The President is believed to have relied upon the opinion of the Home Ministry which had advised him to take a lenient view of the case. The Ministry is learnt to have advised Mukherjee that Dewan is from a poor background and murdered his wife, sons and a neighbour due to abject poverty and unemployment.

Source: http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/president-pranab-mukherjee-commutes-death-penalty-of-assam-man/ [last accessed 09 April 2015]

Indian Express 09 April 2015

Assam - Reprieve for death row convict- President commutes Jorhat jail prisoner's sentence to life

Saturday , March 28 , 2015 

Jorhat, March 27: The commutation of the death sentence of Bahadur Dewan alias Tote Dewan - a death row convict lodged at the Central Jail Jorhat - to life sentence by President Pranab Mukherjee yesterday has ended the uncertainty in the prisoner's life.

The prisoner had filed a mercy petition before the President almost a year ago. Earlier, a similar mercy petition had remained pending with the Assam governor for eight years, with the then governor J.B. Patnaik rejecting the plea on December 23, 2013. Dewan, 66, had sent his mercy petition to Rashtrapati Bhavan through the jail authorities, who forwarded it to the state home department on February 10, 2014.

Dewan had requested jail officials to assist him in filing the mercy petition to the President, as he has no family and no one has come to the jail to meet him till date, prison sources said. Dewan, who hails from Seshapukhuri Nepali Basti under Morhanhat police station in Sivasagar district, had hacked to death his wife Gouri, 35, sons Rajib, 10, and eight-month-old Kajib, and neighbour Budhimaya Dewan, 60, on September 30, 2002.

He reportedly had a quarrel with his wife the night before and after waking up early next morning, he picked up a dao (machete) and hacked Gouri and their two sons to death. He then knocked on the door of his neighbour Budhimaya and when she opened it, killed her as well. He has been lodged in Central Jail Jorhat since he was shifted from Sivasagar District Jail on April 12, 2004. The death sentence was awarded to him by the Sivasagar district and sessions court on December 26, 2003 followed by confirmation of the sentence by Gauhati High Court on April 28, 2005, and then by the Supreme Court on August 8, 2005.

Central Jail Jorhat, jailor Sanjib Kumar Chetia told The Telegraph that no official communication has been received regarding commutation of the death sentence till late this afternoon. Chetia, however, said based on media reports, the authorities had informed Dewan about the development. "Some prison inmates read about it (commutation) in the newspapers and could have told Dewan, so we thought we should inform him before he comes to know about the matter from inmates," Chetia said. He added that Dewan was told that the official letter in this regard was yet to arrive. The jailor said Dewan, who mostly keeps to himself and hardly speaks with other prisoners, smiled on hearing that he has been spared the gallows.

Chetia said Dewan thanked the jail officials, who had drafted the mercy plea and asked him whether there was any legal option available to him to petition the government to set him free. The jailor had assured him (Dewan) that he would discuss the matter with his senior officials and let him know. Chetia said the death row convict works in the jail garden voluntarily and is very possessive about the flowers. "Dewan's conduct is good and he seldom interacts with jail staff and other inmates," he added. Chetia said Dewan earns Rs 55 a day for working in the jail garden and uses the money to buy necessary items. In his plea to the President, Dewan has said he committed the murders because of an "unsound state of mind" and later surrendered himself to police. "I had no motive to commit such a crime but owing to my mental insanity I could not control my rage. Sir, I have already spent 11 years in jail and I repent my act and assure you I shall never indulge in any kind of confrontation in jail........." Dewan said in his plea.

Source: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1150328/jsp/frontpage/story_11280.jsp#.VSZ5V_mUeQo [last accessed 09 April 2015]

Center Seeks Review of SC Ruling on Death Sentence

By Press Trust of India Mar 01, 2014 NEW DELHI, India

The center on Saturday moved the Supreme Court seeking review of its verdict holding that undue delay by the government in deciding mercy pleas can be grounds for commuting death sentences. The center submitted that the January 21 judgment, by which 15 condemned prisoners were granted life and paved the way for similar relief for Rajiv Gandhi killers, is “patently illegal, (and) suffers from errors apparent.”

 It said such an important issue should have been heard by a Constitution bench and the judgment passed by a three-judge bench was without “jurisdiction.” “It is respectfully submitted that the impugned judgment is patently illegal, suffers from errors apparent on the face of the record and flies in the face of well-established principles of law laid down by this court and contained in the Constitution and other statutes,” the review petition said. “It is submitted that in the present case, the issue raised was that of the commutation of the death sentence to life imprisonment on the ground of delay, which allegedly attracted Article 21 (right to life) in favor of the convicts.

 “Therefore, it involved a substantial issue of interpretation of the Constitution and ought to have been heard by a bench of five judges, as mandated under Article 145 of the Constitution,” it said.

Source: http://www.indiawest.com/news/17277-center-seeks-review-of-sc-ruling-on-death-sentence.html [accessed 24 April 2014]

Batla House convict gets life term

New Delhi, July 30, 2013 Mohammad Ali

Shahzad Ahmad fined Rs. 95,000, and Rs. 40,000 from the sum will be given to the family of the inspector killed in the encounter

Shahzad Ahmad, convicted for his role in the 2008 Batla House encounter, was sentenced to life imprisonment by a court here on Wednesday.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs. 95,000 on him, and Rs. 40,000 from it will be given to the family of Special Cell Inspector M.C. Sharma, who was killed in the encounter. S. Qamar, one of the lawyers of Shahzad, said he would appeal against the verdict in higher courts.

On Thursday, the Court of Additional Sessions Judge Rajender Kumar Shastri convicted Shahzad, 25, for firing at police officers, causing the death of Sharma.

The Delhi Police had sought the death penalty for Shahzad, arguing that his crime constituted the rarest of rare cases and there was “no scope for [his] rehabilitation and reform.” The court, however, rejected the prosecution’s plea. “Ruminating on the facts of the case and the circumstances of the convict, I find mitigating circumstances more than aggravating ones, and hence the case … is not a ‘rarest of the rare case,’ which warrants the death penalty upon the convict,” the judge said.

One of the aggravating circumstances which the court cited includes attempts by Shahzad to obstruct police officers from doing their job by attacking them and killing Sharma in the process. Rejecting the police argument that Shahzad had a history of “heinous crime,” the judge expressed the hope that there “are chances of his being reformed and return to the mainstream of society.”

“Admittedly, this convict has not been found guilty till now, of any offence he has been charged with. An accused is presumed innocent till he is proven guilty is an oft-cited tenet of law. God willing, the convict would have learnt values of civilised society,” the judge added.

One of the several mitigating circumstances was that “the convict is a young boy, aged 24-25 years, stated to be a student.” Another factor was that the incident at Flat No. 108, L-18, Batla House, was “not premeditated and occurred in the spur of the moment.”

The encounter took place on September 19, 2008 between officers of the Special Cell of the Delhi Police and suspected terrorists, resulting in the death of Sharma and two alleged terrorists. Shahzad was said to have fired at the police party while fleeing. 

Source : http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/NewDelhi/Shahzad-Ahmed-gets-life-term-in-Batla-House-encounter-case/Article1-1100637.aspx

Is 14 years imprisonment an alternative to death penalty? SC asks

Dhananjay Mahapatra,TNN | Apr 20, 2013
NEW DELHI: Is life sentence, which generally translates to 14 years in prison, a good alternative to death penalty in heinous and gruesome murders which fall just short of being categorized 'rarest of rare" to invite the extreme punishment?

This question from the Supreme Court related to those cases where trial courts impose death penalty but higher courts, after scrutinizing the evidence afresh, find that the case falls just short of being bracketed under 'rarest of rare' category not warranting award of capital punishment.

A bench of Justices P Sathasivam and M Y Eqbal was confronted with this question in the case where one Sahib Hussain was found guilty of murdering five persons and was awarded death penalty by a Rajasthan court. The high court commuted the death penalty to life imprisonment with a rider that it would not be less than 20 years in prison.

Justice Sathasivam, writing the judgment for the bench, upheld the 20-year sentence but found that in a recent judgment (Sangeet vs Haryana), the SC had criticized award of sentences ranging between 20 years and 35 years in gruesome murder cases which fell outside the purview of 'rarest of rare' tag by a whisker.

In that judgment, the apex court had said it was impermissible for courts to limit the power of the government to grant parole or remission to convicts sentenced to life. In most cases of life imprisonment, convicts, on showing good conduct, get entitled to remission and are let out after spending 14 years in jail.

The bench of Justices Sathasivam and Eqbal said the judgment criticizing higher courts for awarding sentences ranging between 20 years and 35 years as an alternative to death penalty was unwarranted, given the fact that state governments had granted remission without adequate reasons or even on flimsy grounds.

"It is clear that since more than a decade, in many cases, whenever death sentence has been commuted to life imprisonment where the offence alleged is serious in nature, while awarding life imprisonment, this court reiterated minimum years of imprisonment of 20 years or 25 years or 30 years or 35 years, mentioning thereby, if the appropriate government wants to give remission, the same has to be considered only after the expiry of the said period," the bench said.

The bench supported its reasoning with the Swami Shradhananda judgment, in which the apex court in 2008 had said, "When an appellant comes to this court carrying a death sentence awarded by the trial court and confirmed by the high court, this court may find that the case just falls short of the rarest of rare category and may feel somewhat reluctant in endorsing the death sentence.

"But at the same time, having regard to the nature of the crime, the court may strongly feel that a sentence of life imprisonment subject to remission normally works out to a term of 14 years and would be grossly inadequate."

It had further said, "What then should the court do? If the court's option is limited only to two punishments, one a sentence of imprisonment, for all intents and purposes of not more than 14 years, and the other death, the court may feel tempted to find itself nudged into endorsing the death penalty. Such a course would be disastrous.

"A far more just, reasonable and proper course would be to expand the options and to take over what, as a matter of fact, lawfully belongs to the court, that is the vast hiatus between 14 years' imprisonment and death. It needs to be emphasized that the court would take recourse to the expanded option primarily because in the facts of the case, the sentence of 14 years imprisonment would amount to no punishment at all." The court had ordered that Shradhananda would not be released from jail.

Source : http://m.timesofindia.com/india/Is-14-years-imprisonment-an-alternative-to-death-penalty-SC-asks/articleshow/19642922.cms

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