Law
commission has requested people to give their opinion on the policy
of death penalty. Here is my opinion based on certain argument as per
my convictions. As it is in India death penalty
is not frequented and if any body is given death penalty he/she goes
on appealing to higher and higher courts and in the end (after
several years) President of the Government decides about it. And we
see that only in very rarest of rear cases gets this penalty.
There
always is an argument that death penalty is due to desire for revenge
for what brutal act is done by the accused. They use a term, "eye
to eye reaction". I do not agree to this argument. Death penalty
is not any vengeance as this argument suggests. In none of the
rulings given by Courts it is so shown that the Court is giving that
verdict as a reaction of vengeance. It is a cleansing operation. I
explain what I mean by cleansing operation. Suppose a person has
appendicitis problem and to get out of that trouble he gets operated
on to remove the part. That makes his living better or normal. This
removal of appendicitis is called a cleansing operation. We do it to
keep things in normal condition. If that useless part is not removed
from the body the person may die if it bursts. Therefore, to save the
person we take the decision to remove that part and throw it away. It
is not a case of any vengeance against appendicitis. Similarly, when
we find that a certain person has become menace to society we have to
get rid of him/her and by that cleanse the society. If such person is
allowed to stay as a free man/woman in the society our society will
be in great peril. By death penalty exactly that is achieved. If we
do not give death punishment we have to keep him or her in lock up to
save society from that menace. Who will pay for that up keep? And
why? We keep prisoners so that we may give them a second chance to
improve their habits of indulging in criminal activity. The cost of
keeping them is borne by the tax payers. Nobody bothers for that as
the tax payers do not ask why his money is being spent on such wrong
doing people. In none of the budgets FM never explains where the
money they extract from pockets of tax payers spend. Particularly how
the expenses of prisons are arranged. We generally expect that
prisoners will pay for their expenses by working but it is not the
practice so far. We tax payers bear the cost of prisoner's lodging,
boarding and medicine. Now the question comes is why should tax
payers bear the cost of these unwanted people who are nothing but
menace to the society?
Tax
payers are taken for granted and their money is used to keep this
unwanted people alive for life. How just it is? This is similar to
any arrangement by which a painful appendicitis is kept in body by
taking pain killer and other artificial treatment just to show that
we the society as a whole do not have any vengeance to this hazard.
Any
argument to justify refusing death penalty, which is proposed to
protect law bearing citizens is not acceptable because it is based on
falsehood. Let me show the falsehood in the arguments to avoid death
penalty. Typical argument I give here for example.
"Such
acts are generally committed under the extreme emotions of rage,
fear, or hatred; which leaves no room for reason to weigh the after
consequences of what has been done under that rage".
This
is a typical argument put up by the defenders of opposition to death
penalty. Falsehood in this argument is very clear, in as much as the
fact that all persons pass through such situations in his/her life;
but not all indulge in crime. Why this difference? Most persons have
to pass through such situations in their life not once but on many
occasions nevertheless, they successfully control their passion for
reaction and avoid doing any wrong thing. What is the difference in
these two people? People are either normal or abnormal. Abnormal
people cannot become normal, and so society must get rid of them to
protect society's safety.
I
may put some of our Yogic examples to explain why majority people can
control while a few cannot control. As per our Hindu belief person is
having five types of behavioral moods. They are Criminal, Tamas,
Rajas, Satwa and Saintly. Some are in criminal behavioral mood and
they are responsible for most crimes in the society. Yoga science
suggests that when a person decides to become a Sadhaka (practitioner
of yoga) he decides to practice Yoga. He/she has to first correct
his/her spiritual address. If he/she is in Tamas mood he/she has to
improve from that to first Rajas and then to Satwa and finally to
Saintly. His real practice for spiritual improvement begins only when
the practitioner reaches the level of Saintly behavior. This I write
here because a person who is in Criminal mood he/she cannot improve.
Society cannot allow such person freedom of activity in society as
he/she is in criminal mood creating problems for the society. People
in criminal mood are not possibly improvable and so such persons are
not supposed to practice Yoga. That means our Yoga Shastra has ruled
out any possibility that a person in criminal mood can be a serious
Yogi. Such persons are condemned as abnormal people and so not
recommended to practice Yoga. Modern psychology endeavors to improve
abnormal people to normal but so far these experiments have utterly
failed. Therefore, it is wiser to remove them from the society. In
earlier times these people were banished from kingdoms. On doing that
such criminals would move to other places and create menace there.
Killing them is best course. The process is to protect society, these
elements must be removed from the society. Keeping them in prisons is
not suitable for the tax payers. Why should tax payers pay for
lodging, boarding and medicine of these people? This amounts to
punishing innocent tax payers!
Our
Hindu faith accepts that we are not dead permanently. There always is
rebirth, second chance. Therefore, by giving these unwanted people
death penalty we give them that chance early. If they are not removed
by death penalty lesser quality people in the society I mean Tamas
people inadvertently begins to believe that being criminal is not so
bad. This gradually encourage them to demote them to criminal mood
from Tamas mood. This development is not suitable for that society.
When such person is declared death penalty that gives signal to these
Tamas people that they should control themselves
and that saves the society from turning more criminal. There is no
reason to feel that it is a vengeance.
I
compare death penalty with mercy killing request. Both are having
similarity. Death penalty is decided by the society to cleanse the
society of some irreparable element in the society. Mercy killing is
also cleansing of people who cannot be repaired out of their
grievances. Both are cleansing operations and equally important for
the upkeep of that society. We see reluctance on the part of law
makers to accept mercy killing and we also see similar resistance for
continuing of death penalty. They give examples of other so called
civilized societies, showing that death penalty is amounting to
savagery. According to me death penalty has nothing to do with
concept of civilized society. Tomorrow if we accept mercy killing the
same so-called civilized societies will condemn it as an act of
uncivilizedness!
In
this I see a certain type of psychological problem with these people.
These are people who are afraid of death. And whenever any thought or
suggestion comes up that can suggest death of any type these people
come out with stereotype arguments to oppose that. I notice that
protector of these criminals under various excuses have a certain
style to justify their resistance to death penalty. One psychologist
suggests that some potential criminals
want protection to these criminals, so that in case they are found in
similar crime, they be saved.
There
are other questions Law commission should answer to people. What is
justice? Does Law commission equate a law abiding person and a law
breaking person on the same level? Justice to whom? To offer mercy
to a person who has no mercy for fellow people on what grounds?
Trying to justify a heinous act on the grounds that it was done out
of emotional burst, how correct it is?
Finally
I want to refer to Bhagwatgita, In Bhagwatgita in first two chapters
Arjun puts up his argument to show sympathy to cruel Dhuryodhan and
all arguments given are similar to those put up by defenders of
opposition to death penalty. After his argument Lord Krishna tells
him that he is talking nonsense and condemned all his arguments. Then
he tells how killing these cruel people is good for society. I
suggest, let us follow teachings of Gita and continue to have death
penalty. Present practice of "rarest of rear" is good
policy and so I request that Law Commission keep present status of
this law as it is.
Before
I conclude my argument I wish to tell my readers that in TOI (August
28 2014, The Speaking tree) they wrote that on Law Commission website
a questionnaire is available but when I opened it I did not find any
questionnaire. I do not understand why Law Commission is giving false
promise that they are giving out a questionnaire for people to give
their opinion. It so appears that our Law Commission
(www.lawcommissionofindia.nic.in)
has
already decide what to do and this announcement is only an eye wash
to show that all decisions are taken, to create an impression that
they are deciding everything, after consulting People! When I wrote
to that website on their email ID (lci-dia@nic.in)
I received no reply! Therefore, I put my points here on my blog. I
also contacted Times reporter, Thomas ( Shibu.Thomas@timesgroup.com)
but he also did not bother to reply. I had asked him to send me the
questionnaire if he has
one.
I wonder why Law Commission not publish that questionnaire in any
reputed news paper such as Times of India? I have reason to feel that
our Law commission wants to deceive people.
You may contact me on my Email ID given below,
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may visit blog, Ideas
and tips on any subject,
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for intelligent discussions.
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