New Delhi: Even if the convicted Pakistani terrorist Ajmal Kasab is sentenced to death by the Sessions Judge M L Tahliyani, and ratified by both the High Court and the Supreme Court, its execution might not come early as there are already 29 other convicts who are currently on death row. As per the rule, Kasab cannot be executed until the backlog is cleared.
Unlike many countries of the world, death penalty in India is an exception and not the rule. The capital punishment is awarded only in 'rarest of rare cases' for capital crimes such as murder, gang robbery with murder, abetting the suicide of a child or insane person, waging war against the government, and abetting mutiny by a member of the armed forces.
At present, there are 29 mercy petitions pending before President of India. In the year 2007, as many as 100 death sentences were awarded by various courts in the country.
In 2006 the figure stood at 40 while in 2005, 2002 and 2001 as many as 77, 23 and 33 convicts were condemned. Some of the high profile people to have been sentenced to death by courts include former MP Anand Mohan the murder of an IAS officer in Bihar, former Congress leader Sushil Sharma for the murder of Naina Sahani, Afzal Guru for plotting terrorist attack on Indian Parliament in 2001 and Santosh Kumar Singh for the rape and murder of Delhi University student Priyadarshini Mattoo.
However, in terms of execution, the last convict to have faced the gallows was Dhananjoy Chatterjee who was hanged on 14 August 2004 for rape and murder of a minor.
Human Rights organisations like Amnesty International have been demanding a blanket ban on capital punishment in India. The capital punishment is already banned in several European countries like UK and France. Countries like Iran, China, Saudi Arabia and US top the list of countries registering highest number of executions.
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