There is a nice post in Wikipedia on capital punishment. I was wandering for long on this issue: whether capital punishment is desirable in our society. I first came across the issue of capital punishment, while I had been reading about the case of Dhananjoy Chatterjee. People celebrated his death sentence and attributed the execution a victory, however, some people expressed their concern on the issue of capital punishment (Click here). Recently, Bombay High Court as well as Supreme Court of India awarded capital punishment to Ajmal Kasab. In this case too people celebrated his death execution.
However, I am confused. I am not sure what is happening in the name of justice. In the recent Delhi rape case (Click here) some section of people demanding capital punishment or even brutal treatment to the accused.
I am wondering to know the reasons behind such demands. Why do we want to kill each other? Why does state provide capital punishment to an individual? But, I also need to understand when does state award capital punishment to an individual and what message does it send to people?
We need to develop a consensus meaning whether the act of killing is a crime? If act of killing is a crime, it is a crime in all circumstances. However, the degree of offence would vary. For example, if I kill a person for my self defence, which otherwise, would lead to my death is a crime. But offence of committing this crime is not as severe as it would be a planned murder. Now, when a court award capital punishment, it actually does it in well planned manner. When people demand such punishment for the criminal offences, they actually demand in a cold blooded fashion. In doing so, we actually legitimize killing. The punishment of a crime can not be the crime itself. Doing so, state just retains the oppressive power relationship and does not discourage the crime itself.
On the other hand, awarding capital punishment to some individuals dilute and divert attention to systemic issues and the solution is trivialized by reducing the problem at individual level. The act of individual is inherently designed by society and we can not deny it. We must have the courage to accept that we are part of unjust social inequality. Everyday we commit mistakes and crimes with others as well as self. We do not want others to prosper, because we are afraid of our own future. We are opportunistic and ruthless in certain aspects, the aspects of our immediate interest.
We want to kill citizens of country B, because we are citizens of country A. We want to make fun of people of state C, because we are from state D. We make fun of language E, because we speak language F. We do not like vegetarians. We vegetarians attribute non-vegetarians as demon. We do not want to kill person G, but instigate H to kill or harass G. We do it everyday. Thousand of students are traumatized every year due to ragging in educational institutes. If capital punishment is the solution no one will be there on this earth.
It is important to see the problem, the crimes as part of society and solution of these lies in collective sharing of responsibilities. Any opportunistic solution will lead to cosmetic changes and would even deteriorate the overall societal picture. In India, we have colonial structure in almost every institution. We have to understand that we have to change system more carefully than any other venture. We have to see the reality with more caution. We have to think about anticipated consequences in order to follow our demand.
Consider the recent case, of our demand of capital punishment. We know that our police system is suffering from several inadequacy and negative political interference. There is nice article on sociology of rape and societies narrow view towards women. The article describes the nature of treatment people provide to rape victims. And police system is no way different (Click here). If the punishment for rape is declared death, it would be more probable that offender will kill the victim to eliminate evidences. On the other hand it is quite possible that people will pay more bribe to escape from the situation and the offence become a lucrative income source of various social components. On the other hand it would be possible that people will be hired to provide proxy for the accused.
I can remember a scene from the movie Gangajal. Please watch and think:
If we want democratic egalitarian society we must have to sublime our frustration and anger to constructive nation building. We have to reflect at every step. Blaming others is fine, it is better to start reflect on our own action at both individual and collective level. We need to engage in long discourse. We have to cultivate the quality like patience to hear own critics. We have to ask whether we are heading to real development? We have to ask that whether we are depriving a large community from accessing basic needs and amenities? Every developmental agenda need to be scrutinized in favor of collective interest, at both national and global level.
We need to set a collective goal where we will provide every criminal with utmost human dignity. I do not know … I am confused … But for me violence can not be a panacea to combat violence. The only thing I can celebrate is maintaining human dignity. This is my last post for this year. I will try my level best to practice what I preach in the coming year 2013.
For further reading:
- Saheli (February, 1999). Capital punishment for rape: Can it tackle the growing violence against women?
- A Campaign: Say no to capital punishment (Click here)
PACIFIC 
Well said saurav. I liked that you raised the issue of reducing problem at individual level. Capital punishment is not the solution. I feel that people especially men ( pointing towards men..m not biased but as per the situation I had to choose men here ) who are protesting …and asking for capital punishment for the rapists in this case… It is very much possible that some of them themselves are rapists..or might have been involved in some kind of sexual harassment ..or going to be rapists in future….so u r right that here is need for everyone to reflect on every action. Only then we can hope for better future.
Recently we saw a movie called ‘Accused’, when I see these people shouting ‘hang them’ ‘hang them’ it remind me a scene from that movie where people are shouting ‘rape her’ ‘rape her’. I don’t see these two act as different, for me both these acts are motivated by same belief that s/he deserves it.
I have serious doubt that capital punishment will solve this problem, rather, as you said, it will dilute the situation. It will make us believe that we have done something and will leave this issue there only.
I am not sure that I understand your view point clearly … From what I make of it … I agree and disagree with you. To a certain extend I do agree with you that an eye for an eye is never the right solution. But I believe there are exceptions. As in the case of these increasing incidents of crimes against women in particular, a strong message need to be sent to these “____________” (Not adding a word here as there is no word to fit these mad devils). For it looks like they are an untamed wild breed and they are not just handful of people either! They do not repent their act and they are not people who reflect. But may be just may be they could be controlled by a stronger fear of harsher punishments. Our current law system for sure takes all these incidents too lightly for them to be reassured again and again that they could get away with it. its now or never. It’s about making sure that these men will know that they cant get away with it. It’s about sending across the right message. But yes as you said making a new law is not going to do it. It might just add a new loop hole to be manipulated. So stronger rules and stronger means to implement the rules both will have to go hand in hand.
“They do not repent their act and they are not people who reflect.” — How will you ever know that if you kill them off before they have had time to reflect? As long as this death penalty is in place, victims are constantly denied justice. For a victim justice means something else than than justice means for the bystanders. What a victim needs is exactly this reflection on the perpetrators side; to see that they have realised what they have done is the only thing that will bring peace for the victims. But that does not happen during the trial. It never does. That only happens when the rapists had time to think and reflect, had some counselling where they are confronted with the impact their actions had on their victim’s lives. Not killing the perpetrators is the only way to justice for the victims.
Your points are valuable. Actually what I feel that basic problem is our half cooked democracy, because we just adopted the colonial methods in almost all area. Everybody knows that police reforms are necessary but we are not doing it. Our legal system is just following rough justice based on the emotions as our films are showing it. If we see Foolandevi’s case then the killing by her was different than killing by any terrorist because here people’s emotions are mixed in our law and verdicts. we have seen this example in Ayodhya verdict case. And people always think and use to glorify rough justice. And yes, as you & pragya said first we have to improve ourselves. In those protests general V K singh was protesting, who was silent on Rapes done by Army-men in Kashmir, Madhur Bhandarkar was protesting who was involved in a casting-couch, Sushma swaraj shouted on government but she was silent when her party related outfit goons beat some girls in mangalore, ABVP is protesting, whose goons molested a college girl in Bangalore, In congress and BJP and in many parties many MLas and MPs are rapist; surveys showed this. In a country where people and media glorified a person who was responsible for provoking riots and government gave him a state-respect, where a person who was unable to control rapes in riots is winning elections and people are favoring him for the post of PM, army and police molesting and raping girls (as SP ankit garg did with Soni sori). I could say that capital punishment is not any solution. Yes we can say that this case is Rarest of the rare but I think life imprisonment will realize those culprits their ugly acts. Two of those culprits already asked for capital punishment for themselves.
Sauravpeace, I agree with you 100%. Capital punishment is not a solution. However, by that I mean that we haven’t found a solution yet. Secondly, a crime must be looked at from the holistic level in the sense that it is not just the direct criminal responsible for the problem. Most believe rape ‘deserves’ a capital punishment partly because of how ‘Society’ will handle the victim. And regarding having a consensus, I doubt that that’s possible.
thanks for sharing– agree with the broad sentiments
“অনেক দিন থেকেই শুনছি মেয়েরা বুঝি ঘরের বাইরে নিরাপদ নয় !! তাই মনে হল কিছু বলি । বাইরে দেখার আগে আমরা যদি একবার নিজের ঘরের মেয়েদের দিকে একবার তাকাই তাহলে নিশ্চয়ই আন্দাজ করতে পারব আমাদের চোখের সামনেই ( যুগ , বছর , মাস নয় মাত্র দিনে একটিবার খেয়াল করি যদি ) আমাদের ঘরের মেয়েদেরকে আমরা নিজেরাই কত অন্যায় অবিচারের দিকে ঠেলে দেই ! জন্ম থেকে শুরু করে শেষ অবধি আমরা আমদের ঘরেই কত সংঘর্ষের মুখোমুখি হই!!! ইংরাজিতে একটা কথা আছে না ” charity begins at home ” ! তাহলে কি আমরা পারি এই ছোট্ট পরিসরে আমাদের দৈনিক দায়িত্বটুকু সামলাতে ? একবার ভেবে দেখুন ! কেবল মোমবাতি নিয়ে বাইরে লোক না দেখিয়ে আমরা যদি মনের প্রদীপ টাকে আলো করে একবার চোখ খুলে নিজের দিকে তাকাই তাহলে দেখবো কত ছোট অথচ ক্ষমার অযোগ্য অন্যায় আমরা নিজেরাই করে বেড়াচ্ছি !! তাহলে কি আমরা চুপ করে থাকবো ? না । নিজের ঘরের মেয়েদের চোখের জলটাকে মিটিয়ে আমরা যদি এগোই তাহলে আমাদের প্রতিবাদী সুরটা মনে হয় আর ও তীব্রতর হবে !! আমাদের যে গোঁড়ায়ই গলদ !! গাছের জড়ই যদি ঘুণে ধরা হয় তো উপরের ডালপালা সুন্দর করে কি হবে? বাঁচাতে পারবেন সেই গাছটা ? বোধহয় না !!”
http://ishanerpunjomegh.blogspot.in/2013/01/blog-post_1.html
sourabh
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Ami ei bepare khub e confused.
”On the other hand, awarding capital punishment to some individuals dilute and divert attention to systemic issues and the solution is trivialized by reducing the problem at individual level………..”
Ami tomar ei statement e biswas kori. Eta aage bhabi ni. Darun bolecho.
“The punishment of a crime can not be the crime itself.”..Eta ekta philosophical statement. Amra normal obosthay medicine khai na karon ota tokhon kharap korbe. Tobe sobcheye baaje kichur sasthi mrityu-dondoi hobe seta mante parchi na. Bhalo ebong manobik sasthi khuje berkora uchit. R oi dhoroner crime jeno na hoy tar o rastha khuje ber kora uchit.
Kon kon issue te mrityu dondo thakbe setao bolte parchi na. Tobe Kasab issue tate kichu bolar ache. (1) O kintu mortei esechilo. (2) Oke bachiye rakhle desher onek khoroch hoto. O jodi etota jono-rosh e na porto tobe oke bachiye rakha jeto.
Bottom line: Ami confused. Mrityudondo ta bhalo solution noy. R ete kore amader goloder kono uttoron hobe na.
Tumi eta ki banglay likhte parbe? Ta hole Bangla news paper e chapano jeto.
Tomar article ta niye ami bitorko ahban korchi
http://www.facebook.com/groups/ishanerpunjomegh/
Well to begin with here I’m specifically talking about rape cases- and as you know I support capital punishments in exceptional cases. As you said punishing a culprit is a planned thing or cold blooded plan, in most of the cases we give capital punishments to those who had planned the crime.
Can you guarantee that after or even during life long jail the person would change completely and would not indulge into criminal acts again??
What about the girl? Who is going to get her out the trauma? And title given to her as “Raped”, which unwillingly changes her life completely. I really don’t understand when human right people ask the society, the court to look at the culprit as a human being and completely neglect the girl who is going to go through hell without any fault. What are your views about the cases where the culprits, through various ways manage to escape the punishment and then trouble the girl or at times get respect from society in due course of time since they are men and all such things are negligible just because they are men and the girls carry the burden of being raped and receive taunts from the same society.
I want capital punishment so that at least that past or the cause of their terrible past would not be there. Yes it is not going to change the attitude of the people but the mental pain might get reduced for the girl.
Also it is not just for the girl but reducing the potential threat from the society about whom you cannot guaranty that he would not indulge in such crimes again.
You might feel that it’s an emotional outburst from me but it’s emotions who rule me and many of the women folk. Though we are talking of women empowerment (even I support it strongly) we need time to change ourselves and the society and to look at rapes and the victims to take rapes in the way Western world takes it. I mean at lest women are not so traumatized or looked down as we do (at least my reading and a few instances shown on TV made me come to this conclusion).
I would continue supporting such punishments at least till the shame, trauma related to such things is there. Unless and until the society changes its outlook towards such girls, women and unless the women are made so strong to look into the eyes of the culprit with confidence and make him realize that it’s not they but the culprit should be ashamed of his act. Maybe then I might be able to take it as a mistake and not some life changing thing and so I will treat it as an incident which is not going to affect me life long and so to think of giving that person a second chance.
Capital punishment is as fundamentally wrong as a cure for crime as charity is wrong as a cure for poverty.
By Henry Ford
But in rape case the crime is heinous and it needs strict punishment. I think right now our society needs that. This fear of death sentence will at least to some extent will help to decline the crime against women.
Saurav, I partially agree with you. Giving someone a death sentence without giving him/her a sescond chance, but I do believe in capital punishment when the crime is in ur words “planned and cold blooded”.
There are so many factors that should be considered both for giving and not-giving Capital Punishment.
1. Specifically for Rape cases : Recently there was a case where a rapist who was sentenced for some years in jail after releasing soon raped a minor again.. what would you say about this act? Isn’t capital punishment justified here?
2. Delhi Rape Case : 4 men brutally raped and killed a girl and that too in a planned and cold blooded manner, how can someone guarantee that they won’t do this crime again after releasing?
3. Ajmal Kasab : how can indian govt guarantee after releasing(if he would not have been given a capital punishment) Ajmal Kasab who killed so many people on that fateful day would be a totally changed ‘human’.
but yes, there are some other factors that need to be considered also.
For those who rape: even after such a rage against rapists , we still get to know about this heinous crime almost daily. what is the reason? even if strict laws have been passed, they are not stopping, they don’t have fear. The first and probable cause is ‘Alcohol’. When a person is drunk , s/he doesnt remember the laws and the punishment, and the root cause of all this is un-education , not Illiteracy but lack of proper Education.
So even if we have harsh laws, capital punishment, these crimes are not gonna stop until we, people start working at individual levels.
But, laws and punishment are necessary and must be there to ensure justice to the victims. As it starts from our own place, like parents scold there children for doing something wrong, if we, people as parents, teachers, friends, siblings , start educating the human etiquette, the crimes might get reduced. but that needs almost a generation gap to implement and till then let capital punishment prevail to reduce the criminals and demons from our society.
One cannot collect all the garbage in his/her own home for a long time, it needs to be thrown away, dismantled, destroyed.
Saurav, I partially agree with you. Giving someone a death sentence without giving him/her a sescond chance, but I do believe in capital punishment when the crime is in ur words “planned and cold blooded”.
There are so many factors that should be considered both for giving and not-giving Capital Punishment.
1. Specifically for Rape cases : Recently there was a case where a rapist who was sentenced for some years in jail after releasing soon raped a minor again.. what would you say about this act? Isn’t capital punishment justified here?
2. Delhi Rape Case : 4 men brutally raped and killed a girl and that too in a planned and cold blooded manner, how can someone guarantee that they won’t do this crime again after releasing?
3. Ajmal Kasab : how can indian govt guarantee after releasing(if he would not have been given a capital punishment) Ajmal Kasab who killed so many people on that fateful day would be a totally changed ‘human’.
but yes, there are some other factors that need to be considered also.
For those who rape: even after such a rage against rapists , we still get to know about this heinous crime almost daily. what is the reason? even if strict laws have been passed, they are not stopping, they don’t have fear. The first and probable cause is ‘Alcohol’. When a person is drunk , s/he doesnt remember the laws and the punishment, and the root cause of all this is un-education , not Illiteracy but lack of proper Education.
So even if we have harsh laws, capital punishment, these crimes are not gonna stop until we, people start working at individual levels.
But, laws and punishment are necessary and must be there to ensure justice to the victims. As it starts from our own place, like parents scold there children for doing something wrong, if we, people as parents, teachers, friends, siblings , start educating the human etiquette, the crimes might get reduced. but that needs almost a generation gap to implement and till then let capital punishment prevail to reduce the criminals and demons from our society.
One cannot collect all the garbage in his/her own home for a long time, it needs to be thrown away, dismantled, destroyed.
Under Indian conditions, capital punishment is the main solution to deter heinous crimes like cold blooded murder, murder for extortion and gang rapes/ rapes with murders and similar such crimes. The country, as of now, does not have even the basic infrastructure for an effective surveillance system, an uncooperative police with huge population that too with a large number of uneducated/low educated, labour class, unemployeds, drug addicts. Easy access to porn sites on mobile, vulgar movies, ads, item songs and dances coupled with sudden spurt of highly provocative clinging dresses has compounded the problem all the more. Till such time these things are not addressed and mindset change is not brought, there can never be a better solution to the problem of heinous crimes.
Thanks for sharing this article Saurav.
1. Capital punishment is given by the court for the rarest of the rare crimes.
2. and even that can be reconsidered by the President if the person is found guilty and applies for the reconsideration of capital punishment.
“If we are to abolish the death penalty, I should like to see the first step taken by my friends the murderers.”
– ALPHONSE KARR.
This sums up the emotions and opinions of most in support of the death sentence as an appropriate means of punishment for hardened criminals.
The basic purpose of criminal laws of any nation is the reformation of offenders and not retribution. But it is also the responsibility of the same state to protect the interests of the society at large and reiterate the society’s faith in system of justice and capital punishment may be a means to this end.
The reasons in favour of retaining capital punishment include safety (of society), deterrence and costs (of maintaining such criminals in the prisons). It can be seen that capital punishment is an appropriate penalty for many offenders who are perpetrators of the inhuman act of killing people with utmost impunity and disregard for human life. But this is far from being the aim of capital punishment as it is not always possible to hand out the sentence in every instance where the family/ the public at large believe that it is the most suitable punishment. A good example of the same is the Indian case involving Dara Singh who burned alive Mr. Graham Staines, an Australian missionary and his 8 year old son in 1999. The Supreme Court, dismissing the CBI’s plea for death sentence said that the case did not fall within the framework of ‘rarest of rare cases’.
To conclude I would say every system has loopholes and opportunists can use it for the betterment of society or for their selfish purposes. And system is not the only one to be blamed for! My personal viewpoint says that we follow one of the best criminal codes in the world. The problem arises in execution of the same. And to end it I would say the liberty of life of a person cannot be at the cost of another or in most cases several others in the society.
Noopura, Please cite the reference of your write up.
Comment is edited:
1. wikipedia.org page: Capital_punishment_in_India; Indian_Penal_Code; Dara_Singh_(Bajrang_Dal)#Supreme_Court_Verdict
2. Blog link 1
3. Blog link 2
Noopura, Please check the following link and match the content of your write up. Large part of your comment matches with the content of this link. If you have used this source please acknowledge the source.
1. Civil service India