THE UNFRAMED LIVES HAMMERED BY THE CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

By ADITI SAMBHAR
2nd year B.A.LLB.(HONS), Jamia Millia Islamia.

Overview

Capital punishment is a subject you can always count on for a lively discussion with plenty of opinions and lots of questions ently, however, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the death penalty.Whenever the word “Capital punishment” come it is the issue which is always hot on people’s minds. When we hear word capital punishment the imagine that first strike in our mind is prisoner hanging with rope . CAPITAL PUNISHMENT is slipped under radar of lives of society. The term "capital" derives from the Latin caput, meaning "head". Thus, capital punishment is the penalty for a crime so severe that it deserves decapitation (losing one's head).

What is Capital Punishment?

Capital punishment is debatable topic which divided the society into parts one which is in favour of capital punishment and other which is against capital punishment. Capital punishment may be defined as:

 “THE JUDICIAL EXECUTION OF A PRISONER AS A PUNISHMENT FOR A SEROIUS OFTEN CALLED AS CAPITAL OFFENCE OR CAPITAL PUNISHMENT OR DEATH PENALTY”.

Some jurisdictions that practice capital punishment restrict its use to a small number of criminal offences, principally treason and murder. In recent years in the United States, these have also included killings that occur during the course of some other violent felony, such as robbery  or rape. Prisoners who have been sentenced to death are usually kept segregated from other prisoners in a special part of the prison pending their execution. In some places this segregated area is known as "Death Row."

Historically--and still today under certain systems of law--the death penalty was applied to a wider range of offenses, including robbery or theft. It has also been frequently used by the military for looting, insubordination, mutiny, etc

 “The dilemma of kill or be killed, which confronts civilized society daily and   inexorably, is bedeviled by the jumble of panic, superstition, and angry resentment we call punishment, expiation, propitiatory blood sacrifice, justice, and many other imposing names. The dilemma is a hard fact which must be faced and organized."

 In today's world, terrible crimes are being committed daily. Many believe that these criminals deserve one fate: death. Capital punishment, the death penalty, is the maximum penalty used in punishing people who kill another human being - and is a very controversial method of punishment. Criminals guilty of murder receive a verdict of capital punishment. Murder is the unlawful killing of another human being with an intentional or criminal intent. First-degree murder is usually premeditated or by deliberate design. In most states, a person convicted of first-degree murder can be sentenced to the death penalty. Debate over the merits of capital punishment still going on.

Capital Punishment in India

Capital punishment is legal in India although rarely used. Between 1975 and 1991, about 40 people were executed. No one else was executed until 2004.

In August 2004, a 41-year-old man, Dhananjoy Chatterjee, was executed for raping and killing a 14-year-old schoolgirl in Calcutta. This was the country's first execution in 13 years. Earlier notable executions include those of Mahatma Gandhi's and Indira Gandhi's assassins.

In 2005, there were about a dozen people on the country's Death Row. Many levels of appeals are available through different courts and India allows state governors and the president to grant clemency.

The death penalty is to be used in the "rarest of rare" cases according to the Supreme Court, although the meaning of this phrase is not clearly defined. Capital punishment can be imposed for murder, instigating a child's suicide, waging war against the government, acts of terrorism, or a second conviction for drug trafficking.

The death penalty is usually carried out by hanging. After a 1983 challenge to this method, the Supreme Court ruled that hanging did not involve torture, barbarity, humiliation or degradation.

Arguments against Capital Punishment

Some of the major arguments used by those opposed to the death penalty include:

• The death penalty is killing. All killing is wrong, therefore the death penalty is wrong.
• The death penalty is violation of HUMAN RIGHTS
• Torture and cruelty are wrong-  Some executions are botched and the executed suffer extended pain. Even those who die instantly suffer mental anguish leading up to the execution.
• Criminal proceedings are fallible -Many people facing the death penalty have been exonerated, sometimes only minutes before their scheduled execution. Others, however, have been executed before evidence clearing them is discovered. Whilst criminal trials not involving the death penalty can involve mistakes, there is at least the opportunity for mistakes to be corrected.
• Since in many cases at least the defendants are financially indigent - therefore end up being represented by court-appointed attorneys whose credentials are often highly questionable, opponents argue that the prosecution has an unfair advantage
• The race of the person to be executed can also affect the likelihood of the sentence they receive.-Death-penalty advocates counter this by pointing out that most murders where the killer and victim are of the same race tend to be "crimes of passion" while inter-racial murders are usually "felony murders;" that is to say, murders which were perpetrated during the commission of some other felony (most commonly either armed robbery or forcible rape), the point being that juries are more likely to impose the death penalty in cases where the offender has killed a total stranger than in those where some deep-seated, personal revenge motive may be present.
• It can encourage police misconduct
• It is not a deterrent - anyone that would be deterred by the death penalty would already have been deterred by life in prison, and people that are not deterred by that wouldn't be stopped by any punishment. This argument is typically supported by claims that those states which have implemented the death penalty recently have not had a reduction of violent crime. A stronger variant of this argument suggests that criminals who believe they will face the death penalty are more likely to use violence or murder to avoid capture, and that therefore the death penalty might theoretically even increase the rate of violent crime.
• It has also been argued that the death penalty does not deter murder because most murders are either "crimes of passion" or are planned by people who don't think they'll get caught (however this argument could be used for any penalty).
• Some people argue that the death penalty brutalises society, by sending out the message that killing people is the right thing to do in some circumstances.
• It is claimed that the death penalty psychologically harms the executioners, in some cases contributing to "Perpetration-Induced Traumatic Stress", and that even when this does not occur, killing a helpless person in a situation in which the executioner is not in danger may harm the executioner in other ways, such as decreasing his or her sense of the value of life. The suggested conclusion is that when capital punishment is not absolutely necessary to defend society, society has no right to ask executioners to risk their own mental heath in such a way. variously argue that statistics show the death penalty either makes no difference to the number of murders, or actually causes them to increase.

With mandatory appeals and enhanced procedural and evidentiary requirements for capital cases in the USA, the cost of a death penalty case far exceeds (usually by a factor of ten) the cost of a trial and life imprisonment. Executed "terrorists" may become "martyrs". It denies redemption, in a non-religious sense. Some hold that a judicial system should have the role of educating those found guilty of crimes. If one is executed he will never have been educated and made a better person. Even if we have not ourselves physically committed murder, quite possibly we have fantasized about crimes of that sort: we are, ourselves, guilty of many things.

Argument in favour of Capital Punishment

Supporters of the death penalty believe that those who commit murder, because they have taken the life of another, have forfeited their own right to life.

There also are disputes about whether capital punishment can be administered in a manner consistent with justice. Those who support capital punishment believe that it is possible to fashion laws and procedures that ensure that only those who are really deserving of death are executed. Supporters of CAPITAL PUNISHMENT also claim that it has a uniquely potent deterrent effect on potentially violent offenders for whom the threat of imprisonments

 “Furthermore, they believe, CAPITAL PUNISHMENT is a just form of retribution, expressing and reinforcing the moral indignation not only of the victim's relatives but of law-abiding citizens”

There are three major theories of Punishment: -

Defenders of capital punishment generally point to (1) and (2), since it is hard to see how (3) works when the criminal is being killed.

Currently, however, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the death penalty. Imagine a man who commits murder once, is given a fifteen-year jail sentence and is returned to the streets where he kills again. He is imprisoned again only to be released. This could happen since almost one in ten death row inmates has been convicted of murder at least once. That means that some death row inmates have been given more than one chance to rehabilitate in prison and continue to commit violent crimes. Capital punishment is one of the oldest forms of punishment in the world. Most societies have thought it to be a fair punishment for severe crimes, and it is even mentioned as an appropriate punishment in the Bible. American colonists used capital punishment before the United States was a country, and most states use it today.

Opponents of capital punishment cite its arbitrariness and finality as reasons for their opposition against the death penalty. Because capital punishment can lead to an unequal application of justice, sometimes to tey arguments for supporters of the death penalty include:

• Death penalty prevents a repeat offender to ever return to society and continue to harm and murder innocent people.
• People committing the most heinous crimes (usually murder in countries that practice the death penalty) have forfeited the right to life.
• Government is not an individual and is given far more powers.
• The death penalty shows the greatest respect for the ordinary man's, and especially the victim's, inviolable value.
• It strikes fewer "innocent persons" than alternative penalties, as among prisoners and ex-prisoners there are many who relapse into new crimes which strike "innocent persons".
• It provides peace of mind for many victims of crime and their families.
• It recognizes humankind's natural sense of equal justice, in this case, a life for a life
• It is the most effective way to protect society (its structures and its individuals) from a felon.
• It is less cruel than prolonged sentences of imprisonment, especially under the conditions that would be popularly demanded for heinous criminals.
• It is explicitly allowed in constitutions and other documents of basic law.
• It provides extra leverage for the prosecutor to deal for important testimony and information.
• It shows how seriously society looks at the most heinous crimes.
• It enjoys democratic support of the people.
• It may deter violent crime and murder. Many advocates do not hold that this is a primary reason for supporting the death penalty.
• From an economical point of view, it is cheaper to put on an execution than to house a prisoner for life.
• Just as the virtuous deserve reward proportionate to their good deeds, so too the vicious deserve punishment proportionate to their bad deeds. One might even hold, with Kant, that respect is shown to the criminal as someone who has chosen a particular path in life by visiting the appropriate punishment on the criminal. (Objection: Not all virtue needs to be rewarded. Likewise, there may be good reason--mercy, say--to refrain from imposing the full weight of a deserved punishment.)
• Criminals may be led to rethink their lives and set their souls in order by the pressing expectation of death.
• It upholds the rule of law, because it discourages vigilantism or self-help on the part of the victim's family or friends (in the form of lynchings or the retaining of hit men). If not controlled, such self-help can lead to extremely destructive vendettas or blood feuds.

 If capital punishment were used more, there would be fewer inmates on death role. Every time an inmate was executed it would show what happens to people that break the law. If capital punishment were not there in all states, criminals would run wild because they would know that they would not receive any type of capital punishment.

Evaluation

Should the INDIA justice system continue to let violent criminals back on the streets where they are likely to commit murder again? Should Capital Punishment stay in effect in this country? There is an ongoing debate as to whether capital punishment reduces crime rates; ideally, potential murderers (or other criminals) would be too scared of the punishment to commit crime. The counterargument is that it doesn't affect crime rate, because potential criminals think that they won't be caught, so they do not care about punishment until it's too late.There are even studies that have concluded that the death penalty appears to encourage murder. However, like many questions in the SOCIETY, actual research data on this question can be interpreted very differently by people with differing predispositions towards capital punishment. In any event, the actual effectiveness (or lack of it) is largely irrelevant to many who feel strongly about the debate, as their views are based on other factors Is it appropriate for the guilty to impose the most extreme kind of punishment?

THIS QUESTION REMAIN UNASWERED TILL NOW ALSO AS TO WHETHER SOCIETY HAS ANY RIGHT TO TAKE LIFE OR NOT . IF YES THEN CRIMINAL WILL NEVER BE GIVEN OPPORTUNITY TO BECOME BETTER PERSON & IF NO THEN WHO WILL GIVE JUSTICE TO VICTIM OR INNOCNET WHO ARE RAPED,ETC

The debate about capital punishment in India, the specifications for which are gray. System in India is in dire need of some serious lubrication in order to FIND OUT SUCH SOLUTION WHICH WILL MAKE ACCUSE BETTER PERSON & AT SAME TIME JUSTICE FAVOUR TO VICTIM ALSO UPON WHOM THE ASTROCIOUS CRIME IS DONE.