-The Hindu Wasn’t it? Yesterday I mean. Spring announced itself in Delhi. The sun was out, and the Law took its Course. Just before breakfast, Afzal Guru, prime accused in the 2001 Parliament Attack was secretly hanged, and his body was interred in Tihar Jail. Was he buried next to Maqbool Butt? (The other Kashmiri who was hanged in Tihar in 1984. Kashmiris will mark that anniversary tomorrow.) Afzal’s wife and...

-The Hindu Court says appellants deserve no sympathy but modifies death sentence Holding that the age of the accused and the possibility of their reformation were determining factors, the Supreme Court has redefined the ‘rarest of rare’ cases and awarded 30-year imprisonment to two accused who murdered four persons in August 2000. Giving this ruling, a Bench of Justices K.S. Radhakrishnan and Dipak Misra said, “Age, definitely, is a factor which cannot be...

-PTI The 'rarest of rare case' test is not 'judge centric' but depends on the perception of society and whether it would approve the award of death sentence to those convicted in certain types of crimes, the Supreme Court has held. "Courts award death sentence, because situation demands, due to constitutional compulsion, reflected by the will of the people, and not judge-centric," a bench headed by Justice K S Radhakrishnan said. "To award...

-The Times of India A day after the Supreme Court questioned the government's wisdom over existing security cover to VIPs, the Centre on Friday said security to protected persons could be scaled down depending upon the threat perception. Even as a committee, comprising senior home ministry and Intelligence Bureau officials, has been working on rationalizing the list of protected persons, minister of state for home affairs R P N Singh said, "If...

-The Times of India The Supreme Court on Friday accused the government of trying to frustrate the functioning of courts and quasi-judicial bodies by not providing them any facilities as they found these bodies upsetting their decisions. A bench of Justices G S Singhvi and S J Mukhopadhaya made this scathing observation as the Union government failed to live up to its repeated commitment to bring in uniformity in service conditions and...