Capital punishment means giving death sentence to criminals who have committed serious crimes such as murders and terrorist attacks. Capital punishment means that a person is hanged till death.
Though this kind of punishment is very rarely offered to criminals but it is the most difficult punishment that can be offered to an individual.
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But the question that is debated is that should capital punishment be offered? If yes then is the judge of the Supreme Court however high his position might be eligible enough to offer such a punishment to the criminals. As a matter of fact, offering the judgement of killing a criminal is not easy for the judge himself. But the crime is such that letting that person alive in open will lead to the increase in the crime rate in society.
Some say that an alternate to capital punishment is providing lifetime jail sentence for the crime and making him work as hard as possible. But others are of the opinion that a criminal who has killed an innocent or for instance a terrorist has no right to live because when that individual did not mind taking away the life of someone innocent, the government should also not mind in offering death sentence or capital punishment to those who deserve it.
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Before offering the capital punishment, the criminals’ last wish is also asked and fulfilled. But the fact remains; he is bound to kiss death even after his wish is fulfilled. In India, recently, the death sentence was offered to Dhananjoy Chatterjee , a security guard who was executed by hanging for raping and murdering 14 year old Hetal Parekh on March 5, 1990 at her apartment residence in Bhawanipur, Kolkata. Dhananjoy Chaterjee was kept in the jail for 14 years and in order to save him from capital punishment, his family submitted a mercy plea to the President of India Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam. But their plea was not accepted and Dhananjoy was finally hanged till death.
The problem with the Indian judiciary is that it takes too much of time to offer punishment. Dhananjoy was offered death sentence after 14 years of trial. Well the past is the past. Let us consider a recent example. Mohammad Ajmal Amir Kasab, more famously known as Kasab is a terrorist who was involved in 26/11 Mumbai attacks. He along with his nine fellow jihadis attacked the CST railway station, Cama Hospital, Oberoi Hotel, Taj Hotel, Vinoli Chaupati Junction, Nariman House, and Leopold Cafe in Mumbai on November 26, 2008 resulting in the killing of 166 people and injuring 238 others. Kasab was the only one among the jihadis who got arrested and has been offered capital punishment. He even pleaded the Supreme Court to undo his death sentence but his plea was rejected. Till today his final judgement is awaited.
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As a matter of fact, the government is incurring huge expenses to keep him safe and alive. This is a shame for the Indian government and the country as a whole that a criminal like Kasab has still not been offered the final judgement.
In such a case where an individual is involved in killing hundreds of people there can be no punishment which is a justified one except the capital punishment. When such a criminal faces and feels death by himself, then only can he realize the pain of those whom he killed. When he will see his family tolerating the pain of his death, he will understand how the families of the innocent people he killed would be feeling. The convicted individual’s family is at least informed about his death sentence beforehand but the family members of the innocent life/ lives killed by that criminal are not even prepared for the death of their loved ones.
As a result of the practice of awarding capital punishment to the criminals the surviving criminal’s also get an idea of the fact that however much they plea in the end, if they commit a crime that is unforgivable, capital punishment would definitely be offered to them sooner or later. Capital punishment results in creating the feeling of fear for the criminals. A few criminals also exist who are not scared of death at all. But they are scared of the torture they have to face before being offered such a judgement. Capital punishment is thus required in some cases for sure.