By Praful Bidwai
The death penalty issue is making headline news in India, as an Indian, Sarabjit Singh, faces capital punishment in Pakistan for spying and involvement in terrorism.
There is much contestation over whether Sarabjit crossed into Pakistan inadvertently or deliberately. India denies he is a spy. Pakistan's highest court has confirmed his sentence. There is a signature campaign on both sides of the border to save Sarabjit's life. President Pervez Musharraf alone can uphold his mercy petition. But it is not clear if he will. Politics, as well as public perceptions, law and culture, will decide if the man lives or not.
Pakistan's legal system is indeed harsh on the capital punishment issue. Pakistan is one of the few countries in the world, along with the United States, where even minors can be executed.
South Asia, in general, has a poor record on capital punishment. Although precise data is not available, its three largest countries (India, Pakistan and Bangladesh) have hanged close to 2,000 people since 1947. In India, recent statistics are notoriously inadequate-a sad comment in itself. But fewer death penalties have been meted out in recent years.
In Pakistan in 2001, says Amnesty International, at least 150 were sentenced to death, and 13 executed. In 2003, the numbers were 140 and 8. By 2004, they had climbed to 278 and 8, raising the number of those under the death sentence to 5,700. In 2005, 394 were sentenced and 15 executed. In Bangladesh, 357 were given the death sentence since 2001 and at least 10 were hanged.
India's Supreme Court ruled in 1980 that the death penalty should be awarded only in the "rarest" of cases. Yet today, 1,700 prisoners in different jails await execution-by no means a small number.
The President of India has the power to pardon convicts: he can, literally, play God. The current President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, has referred 20 cases of condemned prisoners to the Union Home (Interior) Ministry for review-out of 45 mercy petitions before him. There are apparently the poorest of India's poor people.
But there is a dispute over a fine constitutional point: is the President's power of deciding mercy petitions absolute? Or is he bound by the Home Ministry's advice? If the answer is the second, a dismal future awaits those who have begged the President for a pardon. (Not all 1,700 may have. Many convicts are illiterate, extremely poor and unable even to have a coherent petition drafted on their behalf.)
India's Home Ministry, inheriting a conservative colonial tradition of rule by authoritarian means to "discipline the natives," almost always prefers tough action over humane alternatives. In 2004, it was asked by the President to review 20 mercy petitions. It rejected every one of them. It may well do the same with the new list.
The Ministry is only but one cog in the giant wheel that is the Indian state. The state has been content to execute hundreds of citizens (or, rather, subjects) under draconian laws. And yet, it is hypocritical. The Home Ministry claims that only 55 people were executed in India since Independence in 1947. But the People's Union for Democratic Rights, a leading Indian civil rights group, says that 1,422 executions were carried out in a single decade (1953-63).
PUDR bases itself on government records, in particular, the Law Commission's 35th Report (1965) on 16 states. The state of Tamil Nadu, now known for its Information Technology achievements, topped the list with 485 executions.
One of the most shocking facts about the death penalty in India is the poor quality of official records, including the grounds for capital punishment. Even the Law Commission report doesn't state why so many people were executed in 1953-63. The "Prison Statistics of India" publishes the number of persons executed during each calendar year from 1989 to 2002. This adds up to 35 hangings over 4 years-which makes the Home Ministry's claim of 55 executions over 57 years look incredible.
There has been a robust debate over the death penalty in India. Its supporters cite some oft-cited arguments-that it can deter serious crime, and that the state is duty-bound to punish it, and in any case, the victim's family deserves justice, and so on.
The pitch of their campaign has risen in recent years because hate-crimes, including massacres and targeted murders of religious minorities, were indeed committed since 1992, when Muslims were killed and a 16th century mosque was razed by Hindu fanatics. Again, four years ago, over 2,000 Muslims were butchered with state complicity in Gujarat. Ironically, there have been few convictions for these grave crimes.
Opponents of the death penalty argue that it is unethical and uncivilised for the state to take a citizen's life; that there is a possibility of miscarriage of justice or wrongful conviction, and that capital punishment does not deter serious crime. For instance, a 1988 United Nations survey found no evidence that executions have a greater deterrent effect than life imprisonment. In Canada, the homicide rate declined after the abolition of death penalty in 1976. In 2000, there were 542 murders, 16 less than in 1998 and 159 less than in 1975.
A survey released in September 2000 by The New York Times found that during the last 20 years the homicide rate in the states with the death penalty was 48 to 101 percent higher than in states without it.
Even worse is the case of innocents being executed. As many as 500 people have been executed in the U.S. since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. Over that same period, 75 condemned prisoners have been released after evidence showed that they had been wrongfully convicted. A recent shocking case pertains to Lena Baker, a black maid put to death 60 years ago. New evidence casts doubts over her guilt.
There may be similar cases of injustice in India. Even more grave is the summary execution by the police of suspected terrorists in staged armed "encounters."
Yet, India's social climate is not tolerant, liberal or relaxed enough to support the abolition of capital punishment. As social strife--rooted in neoliberal policies, growing unemployment, widening disparities, unbalanced growth and uprooting of people--rises in India, the demand for "order" becomes more strident. Within this discourse, there is little scope for gentleness or compassion. Given this, India isn't about to join the group of 118 nations which have abolished the death penalty. The need to do so is urgent.
Ironically, Sarabjit Singh's case may trigger some rethinking--if only because many Indians sympathise with the man's plight when pitted against a state which can be as ruthless as Pakistan's, despite being democratic.
Praful Bidwai is former managing editor of the Times of India
India and the Death Penalty |
