B.RAMAN
Fear of death rarely acts as a deterrent to
irrational or well-motivated people. It also rarely prevents crimes of passion
or crimes committed in the heat of the moment.
2.If fear of death can be a deterrent, there should
be no suicide terrorism. Nor should there be other dastardly crimes. They
continue to take place in countries which have death penalty on their statute book. The
US is a typical example.
3. In the US, there is not only death penalty. In
many States, it is even executed in public thinking that it would add to the
deterrence. But it does not.
4. The execution of Timothy McVeigh, who carried
out the Oklahoma bombing in 1995, was televised, but it has had no effect on
potential criminals. There have been many hate and irrational crimes in the US
after his execution, including the recent massacre of innocent worshippers in a
US gurudwara.
5. The long-held impression that death penalty is
necessary in the rarest of rare cases to deter others from carrying out
dastardly crimes has no provable basis.
6. Since last year, I have been arguing against
death penalty due to two reasons. First, it doesn’t deter. Second, there is
always a danger of a miscarriage of justice due to errors in investigation,
prosecution and trial. If the errors come to notice after the execution of the
death sentence, no corrective action is possible. I also believe that a State
should not kill its citizens for whatever reason.
7. At the same time, one has to make an exception
in the case of offences that amount to a war crime or an act of treason. These
are crimes committed by someone---either a foreigner or our own national--- at
the instance of or on behalf of a foreign State or non-State actor involving
deliberate loss of life or national property
or critical infrastructure. In such cases the option of a death penalty should
be available on the statute book to make it clear that anyone who acts at the
instance or on behalf of a foreign State or non-State organisation has to pay a
heavy price that may even involve loss of life through execution.
8. Our laws relating to death penalty need to be
revisited in order to provide for death penalty only against those acting at
the instance or on behalf of a foreign State or non-State organisation. In other
cases, life-long imprisonment should be
the norm.
9.The execution of Ajmal Kasab, the Pakistani
terrorist belonging to the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), who participated in the 26/11
terrorist strikes in Mumbai, was totally justified. We need have no regret over
it.
10. At the same time, I do feel that even in the
case of persons acting at the behest of a foreign State or non-State
organisations there should be special exception
to carrying out the death penalty for reasons of State to prevent
internal disharmony.
11. The case of Afsal Guru, sentenced to death for
participating in the attack on the Indian Parliament in December,2001, should come
under this category. He should not be executed.
12. It is time to re-formulate our laws relating to
death penalty to provide for nuances on the lines mentioned above. ( 23-11-12)
(The writer
is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi,
and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate
of the Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com Twitter @SORBONNE75)
