The recent rise in cases of rape and sexual violence against women has also put the focus back on death penalty. But is death penalty the solution to bring down crimes against women? While many believe that such horrific cases of crime deserves the severest of punishments, many activists also continue to emphasise that ‘an eye for an eye’ approach is hardly the way ahead.
Death penalty is not the way
Death penalty cannot be a deterrent to crimes such as rape in the society. There is no proof of that. On the other hand, capital punishment could lead to more violence. Since perpetrators are aware that they could be punished with death, in many cases they tend to murder the victim so that there are no witnesses against them.
Almost 30 per cent of the death sentences given by trial courts are acquitted in higher courts and in more than 60 per cent of such cases, sentences are commuted. If there is no consensus among judges, the judgment is not absolute.
Then how can the punishment be absolute and irreversible? None of the civilized countries have capital punishment anymore. In India, more than one lakh rape cases are pending in the courts. Is it okay to give out death penalty to one lakh people? This is mostly a struggle between the families of the convict and the victims’ families. The family of the accused has human rights too which people tend to overlook amidst rage. In 94 per cent of the rape cases, the accused is known to the victim.
With death penalty as the punishment and the accused being a family member, it may make it harder for the victim to report the crime. Criminal justice system should not be like mob justice. Demanding death penalty is mob psychology. It also stems from the mentality that a woman loses her ‘honour’— linked to her sexuality— after rape. This is undermining a human being and such thought processes need to change.
Biswapriya Kanungo | Human rights activist
Capital punishment will instil fear
While reforms like developing safety systems from the grassroots are the need of the hour, the death penalty should also stay to retain the fear of the consequences among the masses.
And it should be televised. A revolution is required to bring about the many changes in society to bring down crimes against women. A country will never be crime-free but we need checks and balances. Without capital punishment we can’t stop the rising sexual violence against women.
A lot of us don’t have faith in our corrupt legal system and the due process. What about the human rights of the victims’ families who have to live with the horror for the rest of their lives? We should not be bothered about the rights of people who rape and then murder women. Especially, if they have been convicted in the court of law. There has to be a level of indifference in cases like these. Liberty in democracy shouldn’t mean the accused gets to live another decade or fifteen years and then walk into the gallows.
The judgment and the punishment have to be meted out in a stipulated time-frame. Copies of the judgment should be passed immediately to the upper courts for faster trials as the review petitions for the guilty take up a lot of time. It is about time cases should be live-streamed as well.
Madhumita Samal | social activist