death penalty news August 13, 2004
INDONESIA: EU urges RI to end capital punishment The European Union has urged Indonesia to do away with capital punishment in the country and spare the lives of those on death row. In a statement issued on Thursday, the EU also expressed regret over the recent execution of Indian national Ayodhya Prasadh Chaubey -- who was found guilty of drug trafficking -- in Medan, North Sumatra. "The EU urges the Indonesian government to refrain itself from carrying out more executions and thereby reinstall the de facto moratorium," the statement said. (source: Jakarta Post) ================== INDIA: Is capital punishment class-specific? Is the controversy over death sentence linked to class bias? Many might think so after going through the background of those who were ordered to be hanged by different courts. The case of Dhananjoy Chatterjee, a former security guard of a Kolkata apartment complex, the latest to be on the death row, has a lot in common with others sentenced to death for committing the "rarest of rare crimes". Om Prakash, who killed all four members of his employer Brigadier S Khanna's family, was ordered to be hanged. "He who meticulously planned the murder is liable to death sentence," said the court while ordering the extreme penalty for Om Prakash. One Kheraj Ram also met with the same fate for killing his wife, his son and brother-in-law in a Rajasthan village. The apex court also upheld the extreme penalty given to one Prakash Dhawal who had killed his mother, brother and his wife and three children in a Maharashtra village. But in 1995, the apex court saved a death convict, who had raped and murdered a two-year-old girl, from the gallows by commuting the capital punishment to a life term sentence. "Humanist approach should be taken," said the court while giving reprieve to accused Mohammad Chaman. Though the gravity of offence and the diabolic manner in which it was executed could be crucial factors to determine the quantum of sentence, former Supreme Court Chief Justice P N Bhagwati had declared the extreme penalty as unconstitutional for it was arbitrary and had a "class bias". Though four other judges - the then Chief Justice Y V Chandrachud, Justices N L Unthawalia, R S Sarkaria and A C Gupta (all retired) - unanimously upheld the constitutionality of the death sentence, Justice Bhagwati dissented from them. "There is also one other characteristic of death penalty that is revealed by a study of the decided cases and it is that death sentence has a certain class complexion or class bias inasmuch as it is largely the poor and the down-trodden who are victims of this extreme penalty," Justice Bhagwati said in his verdict on August 16, 1982. He elaborated to substantiate his charge. "We would hardly find a rich or affluent person going to the gallows." Capital punishment, as pointed out by Warden Duffy is 'a privilege of the poor', he said. (source: Times of India)
