Death Penalty
In my contention, Death Penalty has no place in the modern world. It is a reprehensible and morally indefensible act. It is a symptom of a culture of violence, not a solution to it.
The Death Penalty needs to be eliminated from our judicial systems due to the following reasons:
HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION
The death penalty is a “barbaric remnant of an uncivilised society”. Being immoral in principle, it breaches human rights, the right to life, in particular, granted to every individual under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution.
According to a report by Amnesty International published in May 2022, at least 2,052 death sentences were given in 56 countries in 2021, an increase of 39% from the total of 1,477 reported in 2020.
Many countries have acknowledged that the death penalty undermines human dignity and that its abolition enhances and progressively develops human rights.
The global trend is towards abolition. Currently, 108 countries have abolished the death penalty for all crimes.
Several international and regional human rights instruments prohibit the use of the death penalty and encourage its abolition. Such as the “International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights” states that “no one within the jurisdiction of the state party to the present protocol shall be executed.”
Still, capital punishment stands legal in India, with 488 prisoners currently on death row.
DOES NOT DETER CRIME
Often, it is claimed that the threat of executions deters a certain number of criminals, so it is an effective strategy for preventing crimes.
Amnesty International, in a report published in 2022, reported that crime figures from countries which have banned the death penalty have not risen. In some cases, they are going down. In 2003 in Canada, 27 years after the country abolished the death penalty, the murder rate had fallen by 44% since 1975, when capital punishment was still enforced. In 2004 in the USA, the average murder rate for states that used the death penalty was 5.71 per 100,000 of the population as against 4.02 per 100,000 in states that did not use it.
Abdorrahman Boroumand Centre, a Washington, DC-based organisation, revealed in a December 2018 report that nations that abolish the death penalty tend to see their murder rates decline. It examined 11 countries that abolished the death penalty, 10 of which experienced a decline in murder rates in decades following its abolition. Those countries were: Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Poland, Serbia, Estonia, Latvia, Ukraine, South Africa, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia and Albania. Here, only Georgia saw an increase in crime rates.
A country in this set which abolished the death penalty could expect an average of approximately six fewer murders per 100,000 people a decade after abolition. Death penalty advocates’ fears that the state relinquishing the ultimate punishment will embolden potential criminals or at least weaken deterrence is unfounded in light of this evidence.
It is also a myth that such executions prevent terrorism. Those people willing to commit large-scale acts of violence aimed at inflicting terror upon a society do so knowing that they could come to serious physical harm and therefore show little or no regard for their safety. Executions of such people often provide welcome publicity for the groups they belong to and create martyrs around which further support may be rallied for their cause.
So, the death penalty has no deterrent effect at all. It gives a false conviction to people that the government is taking action to combat crime and deliver justice. In reality, it does nothing to protect society from the acts of criminals.
State-sanctioned killing only serves to endorse the use of force and to continue the cycle of violence.
So, the question is — If the death penalty is not a proven deterrent to crime, is it worth the exorbitant costs, risks of error, and other problems inherent to its practice?
DISCRIMINATORY
According to the findings of the National Law University, Delhi, which published its report on the Death Penalty in India, 74.1% of prisoners sentenced in India belong to an economically vulnerable class, and 76% are from backward classes and religious minorities.
United Nations Human Rights experts have also agreed during a meeting in 2017 in Geneva that the death penalty disproportionately impacts society. The people from poor and backward classes become easy targets for the police to lay the blame on.
Isn’t it ironic about the term ‘Capital Punishment’ that only those without capital get the punishment?
The death penalty information centre in Washington, DC, cites in its reports that since executions resumed in 1977, 295 African-American defendants have been executed for the murder of white victims, while only 21 white defendants were hanged for the murder of African-Americans.
And this is not because these minority communities commit more crimes but because they are often sentenced to death when they do.
The death penalty plays a considerable role as an agent and validator of racial discrimination. It is often said to be a system of justice, but it is an institution of racial disparities.
IRREVERSIBLE
The death penalty carries the inherent risk of executing an innocent person. It is non-debatable that, once hanged erroneously, there is no room for rectification.
The supreme court, in 2009, admitted that it erroneously sentenced 15 people to death in 15 years, an error rate of 25%, i.e., for every four people, there is a high chance for one erroneous execution. The court itself revealed the 15 flawed judgements. But many remain unadmitted.
The death penalty information centre has published a partial listing of wrongful executions that, at the end of 2020, identified 20 death-row prisoners who were “executed but possibly innocent”.
NO REDEMPTION
According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime,
- the purposes of a sentence of imprisonment or similar measures derivative of a person’s liberty are primarily to protect society against crime and to reduce recidivism. Those purposes can be achieved only if the period of imprisonment is used to ensure, so far as possible, the reintegration of such persons into society upon release so that they can lead a law-abiding and self-supporting life.
- To this end, prison administrations and other competent authorities should offer education, vocational training and work, as well as other forms of assistance that are appropriate and available, including those of a remedial, moral, spiritual, social and health-and sports-based nature. All such programs, activities and services should be delivered in line with the individual treatment needs of prisoners.
Redemption also forms a part of justice. Though insignificant, it can bring significant changes in crime rates. The imprisonment term is also to make the prisoner realise what he committed was wrong and to sanitise his mindset, thus leading to redemption.
The institution of capital punishment leaves no room for this process.
FAKE GARB OF JUSTICE
Initially, the system of imprisonment was to make a person realise the heinousness of his act. It was forged so that in the solitude of prison, a person ponders upon his actions and later works towards redemption. The death penalty removes any prospect of the same. Most of the criminals hanged do not feel any ounce of regret. They are not able to understand the atrociousness of their acts.
They are executed, mainly, to satisfy the victim and his family members that something has been done in the name of serving justice.
But killing in the name of justice, is no justice.
Justice means doing what is morally right and fair. Is killing a person, who killed another morally right?
Executing someone because they have taken someone’s life is revenge, not justice. Any society that is hanging offenders is committing the same violence it condemns.
At last, as Mahatma Gandhi said, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind”.
Thus, the system of the death sentence needs to be abolished.
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Thanks for reading!
What are your opinions on the death penalty?
