Supreme Court questions 'forgiving' approach to death penalty

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday criticised what it described as the "forgiving" approach of courts in commuting death sentences to life imprisonment, observing that a stage would come when the judiciary would have to draw a line in view of the growing number of crimes in the country.

A bench of justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu said sentencing cannot be viewed only from the perspective of the convict and that the interests of society and victims also must be kept in mind while deciding whether a death sentence deserves to be commuted.

"The court will someday have to draw a line because the country is facing a crisis because of the increased number of crimes," the bench verbally observed during the hearing. The observations came while the court was considering the question of whether a case warranted retention of the death penalty or its commutation to imprisonment for life.


Also read | India, 14 others ink joint ministerial statement to curb structural excess capacity

The bench questioned whether courts, while exercising their discretion in death penalty cases, were becoming too lenient by repeatedly converting capital punishment into life imprisonment. It noted that while the law requires the death penalty to be imposed only in the "rarest of rare" cases, the sentencing also requires the court to balance aggravating circumstances against mitigating factors.

The bench emphasised that the power to commute a death sentence could not become an automatic consequence merely because the convict had spent a substantial period in custody or had shown some possibility of rehabilitation.

It indicated that the gravity and brutality of the offence, its impact on society, the circumstances in which it was committed, and the conduct of the accused would have to be assessed before deciding the appropriate punishment.

Also read | Experiments on animals set to become easier

The bench underlined that the criminal justice system had a larger responsibility towards society. Excessive leniency, it observed, could potentially undermine the deterrent element of punishment and leave victims and their families feeling that justice had not been adequately served.