-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Has the government lost or misplaced former President APJ Abdul Kalam's letter asking for a review of mercy petition cases? The ministry of home affairs has summarily dismissed an RTI application saying it has "no information'' on the subject. Ironically, the former President has written about his reservations on death penalty in his book 'Turning Point: A Journey Through Challenges'. The home ministry's denial was in...
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India has 414 death row convicts: National Crime Records Bureau -Ch Sushil Rao
-The Times of India HYDERABAD: There are as many as 414 death row convicts in jails across the country. The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has reported that there as are many as 106 death penalty convicts are in jails in Uttar Pradesh. Those on the death row in other states include 63 in Karnataka, 51 in Maharashtra, 42 in Bihar, 27 in Delhi, 19 in Gujarat, 16 in Punjab, 14...
More »Atrocities that no longer shock-Kalpana Kannabiran
-The Hindu While the Delhi rape incident saw mass protests for justice, crimes against Dalits hardly evoke such outrage, which is why the killers in the Laxmanpur-Bathe massacre have got away The response by the state to the 2012 Delhi gang rape case was immediate and effective - a commission to review legislative protections and recommend amendments, and a new enactment. The judiciary responded similarly - death penalty for the accused and...
More »There is class bias in awarding death penalty -Harsh Mander
-The Hindustan Times Last winter, two men were hanged to death in India's jails, indicted for crimes of terror. On August 8, another man, Maganlal Barela- a little-known tribal cultivator, charged with killing his five little daughters - was scheduled to hang in the Jabalpur Central Jail. Human rights lawyers chanced to read of his hanging in an online news item the evening before his execution was fixed, and rushed to meet...
More »Why capital punishment must go-Satyabrata Pal
-The Hindu When a death sentence is given to satisfy the "collective conscience of the community," it raises troubling questions about the fairness of the trial The verdict of death for the bestial gang rape in Delhi last December is based on Supreme Court judgments, which stipulate that capital punishment will be imposed in "the rarest of rare" cases, where the community's "collective conscience is so shocked that it will expect the...
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