Death Penalty in India: A Case of Reckless Justice

Abstract

The paper analyses the law and practice of death penalty in India and argues that it fails to conform to the constitutional mandates of equality, fairness and justice. Part-II of the paper deals with thean overview of the death penalty laws in India. Part III contains an enunciation of the challenge to the constitutionality of death penalty and how the Supreme Court has, through a creative formulation of the test of rarest of rare upheld its validity. Part IV examines the decisions of the Supreme Court and analyses to what extent the Court has been able to consistently deliver justice in accordance with the principles of stare decisis and equality of law. The paper follows a three pronged approach in demonstrating why the law and practice of death penalty in India must be objected to. First argument concerns the misinterpretation of ‘rarest of rare’ by later benches of the apex court. Secondly, it analyses cases where similar facts have been treated dissimilarly resulting in a violation of the basic canon of justice that like cases must be treated alike. Finally, the possibility of subjective factors, including the constitution of benches and personal philosophy of the judges creeping in to decision making beyond permissible limits casting shadow on the objectivity of judicial decision making.