20 Sep 2009: The Supreme Court has said that the Government has a duty to decide on the Mercy Petitions of those sentenced to death without much delay.(zee news.com)
20 July 2009: The President is set to discuss with PM Dr. Manmohan Singh the 26 Mercy Petitions that are pending with her………Recently the home ministry decided to clear one mercy petition every month in chronological order. Afzal Guru is 22nd in a list of 28 pending……. (express.india.com) .
Questions that arise:
1.Why not the President Decide? The Mercy Petition is a plea for mercy from the sovereign. It is not an appeal of sorts to be decided on legal, factual basis. That process is exhausted when the Supreme Court has upheld death Sentence. Therefore is it NOT the prerogative of the President rather than of the low functionaries in state n central governments to ‘support/oppose”? So why the President has to await inputs from GOI, who in turn await inputs from State Governor, who in turn awaits inputs from the State Government and so on. And any one of them can stall the entire process and negate all the work done by the country’s slowing moving judicial System.
2.Is it because the President has to act on advice of the Cabinet?
I grant that constitutional possibility. In that case the buck should stop with the Cabinet. And should not start the game of ‘pass-the-buck’ down and up the line.
3.Why in Chronological Order? Each case of death penalty stands on its own merits and has undergone its own long journey through the courts. Similarly the grounds for Mercy and facts-of-the-case are unique in itself. One case has nothing absolutely to do with the other (most of the time). Is this ‘seniority’ system so ingrained in the mindset of the Government machinery that even death penalty must also be executed based on seniority; mercy petitions must also be decided based on seniority? It will take a ‘criminal’ lawyer to clarify whether any statute prescribes such seniority system.
4.Why not fast track cases of National Importance?
It was a wise decision of the Government to appoint a Special court to try out the case of the 26/11 perpetrators. This was done in view of the overwhelming nature of the crime against the State and citizenry of
5.Have we not learnt lessons from the Past?
Are waiting for another Indian Airlines aircraft being hijacked and release of XYZ prisoner being demanded as ransom? Are we giving in to the anti-capital punishment lobby by taken ‘no action’; prolonging the criminal’s imprisonment and thus building an alibi that he has served Life Imprisonment already?
They say in Management, not taking a decision is a vital decision itself.
I wonder where the rules for this convoluted process are laid down and what it will take to change them.
ReplyDeleteRaj: i propose asking some ' criminal ' lawyer about this.
ReplyDelete