-The Times of India Suicide may be a crime in law but the jury is still out on the question of punishment for those who survive the attempt. A bid to take one's own life attracts a jail term of up to one year, but a number of experts feel this amounts to punishing the victim. Now a trial court in Delhi has said that a person who attempts to commit suicide...
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SC questions bias in treating mercy petitions
-The Times of India The Supreme Court on Tuesday was at a loss to understand why convict Dhananjoy Chatterjee's execution was swift, but a lot of political muscle flexing was on show when it came to Beant Singh's killer Balwant Singh Rajoana, who is slated to be hanged on March 31. The controversy over Rajoana's death sentence reached the apex court on Tuesday with a NGO Lawyers for Human Rights International seeking...
More »SC asks Centre, states to give details on pending mercy pleas in three days
-The Times of India The Supreme Court on Wednesday took exception to the delay in getting information relating to pending mercy pleas by condemned prisoners before the President and the governors and asked the Centre and states concerned to provide details about such pendency within three days. Expressing anguish over the casual approach of the governments, a bench of Justices G S Singhvi and S J Mukhopadhyay said this was the final...
More »Pratibha Patil most merciful President in 30 years
-PTI President Pratibha Patil , seems to be the most merciful of all presidents during the last three decades. She has commuted death sentences of 23 petitioners to life imprisonment, which is over 90% of the total pardons granted since 1981. On February 9, she accepted the clemency petition of Sushil Murmu, pending since 2004, who was convicted for giving 'bali' (sacrifice) of a nineyear-old-boy in Jharkhand for his own prosperity,...
More »Learnt in Godhra, forgotten in Jaipur by Aakar Patel
It is difficult to explain to Indians the wrongness of collective punishment. This is because our identity is collective, and so is our behaviour This month is the 10th anniversary of the incident at Godhra and the events in Gujarat that followed. When the violence began, it was said that the media had made the violence worse. Often this was by its innocence and sometimes by its malice. Was this true? The...
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