-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Centre is all set to legally lock horns with the Supreme Court by questioning the court's powers to call for judicial scrutiny the President's exercise of constitutional power to grant pardon or commute sentences of condemned prisoners. "The decision of the President under Article 72 of the Constitution, either accepting or rejecting a petition, is a sovereign act. This sovereign act is performed after the...
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Home ministry draws CIC’s flak for lack of records on President mercy plea since '70 -Himanshi Dhawan
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Central Information Commission (CIC) has rapped the ministry of home affairs after the latter admitted that it did not have data on Mercy Petitions considered by the President since 1970. The Commission has asked the ministry to disclose the information within four weeks in larger public interest. The order came in response to an application by an under trial lodged in Agra's Central Jail. In...
More »Death penalty is inhuman, should be abolished: CPI(M)
-The Hindu The Communist Party of India (Marxist) described death penalty as "inhuman" and said death penalty should be abolished in the country as it is "arbitrarily implemented" and advocated imprisonment till death in rarest of the rare cases. A decision on the party's position was taken at a two-day Central Committee meeting of the CPI(M) that concluded here on Sunday. Talking to reporters here on Monday, CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat said...
More »Germany seeks clemency for Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar -Shubhajit Roy
-The Indian Express Almost a month after the Supreme Court dismissed convicted Khalistani terrorist Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar's plea that his death sentence be commuted to life imprisonment, German President Joachim Gauck and Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle have written to their Indian counterparts seeking clemency for Bhullar. Bhullar, who was convicted for the 1993 car bomb blast outside the Youth Congress office in the capital in which nine people were killed, was...
More »A tale of two verdicts
-The Hindu The Supreme Court's verdict last week quashing the President's rejection of a Mercy Petition by Mahendra Nath Das, who was to hang for a gruesome murder, shows a salutary approach to the question of whether a prolonged delay in disposing pleas for clemency should not be a ground for commuting death sentences to life terms. The court took note of the 12-year delay prior to the rejection of Das's...
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