Jowan John, B.A. LL.B (Hons). School of Law, Christ (Deemed to be University)
ABSTRACT
"Capital punishment is the sentence of death for a serious crime and is often called the death penalty".1 It is a form of sanction given to the rarest of rare cases. This paper focuses on abolishing the concept of the death penalty based on the idea that no person has the right to take one's life. It also focuses on bringing incarceration based on the intensity of the crime instead of the death penalty. The paper also analyses capital punishment with respect to the theories of deterrence and reformative. "The Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights with resolution 44/128 on 1991 aims at abolishing the death penalty."2 On Aug 31, 2015, "the Law Commission of India submitted a report to the government which recommended the abolition of capital punishment for all crimes in India, excepting the crime of waging war against the nation or for terrorism-related offences."3 This paper brings in the need to abolish capital punishment and emphasize the Reformative Theory of Punishment rather than the Deterrent Theory of Punishment.
Keywords: Capital Punishment, Rarest of the rare test, Incarceration, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 1966, Deterrent Theory of Punishment.
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