Abhorrent Nature Of Crime Alone Cannot Be The Decisive Factor For Awarding Death Sentence ; Mitigating Factors Equally Relevant: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court observed that abhorrent nature of crime alone cannot be the decisive factor for awarding death sentence.

Due consideration should also be given to the equally relevant aspect pertaining to mitigating factors before arriving at a conclusion that option of any other punishment than the capital one was foreclosed, the court said while commuting the death sentence awarded to a man accused of rape and murder of a seven year old girl.

The bench comprising Justices AM Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheshwari and CT Ravikumar noted that the accused has no criminal antecedents, comes from a very poor socio-economic background, has a family comprising of wife, children and aged father, and has unblemished jail conduct. 

"When all these factors are added together and it is also visualised that there is nothing on record to rule out the probability of reformation and rehabilitation, in our view, it would be unsafe to treat this case as falling in 'rarest of rare' category.", the court said.

Pappu was sentenced to death after the Trial Court found him guilty of enticing a seven-year-old girl to accompany him on the pretext of picking lychee fruits; having thereafter committed rape upon the child; having caused her death; and having dumped the dead body near a bridge on the riverbank, after having dragged the dead body over a distance of one and one-quarter kilometres. The Allahabad High Court dismissed his appeal and confirmed the death sentence.

In appeal, the bench took note of the evidence on record and concluded that the accused have been rightly found guilty under Sections 376, 302, 201 IPC and Section 5/6 POCSO Act.

"In an overall view of the matter, it is proved beyond doubt in this case that the hapless child, seven-year-old daughter of the complainant, met with her gruesome end after having been treated inhumanely and having been subjected to sexual assaults; that the victim was lastly seen in the company of the appellant when he enticed and took her along to pluck and eat lychee fruits while shooing away the other children playing with her; that the dead body of the victim child was recovered at the instance of the appellant; and that the appellant failed to satisfactorily explain his whereabouts and his knowledge of the location of dead body. The medical and other scientific evidence has been consistent with the prosecution case and then, the defence version of enmity due to land dispute turns out to be false. That being the position, we have no hesitation in holding that the present case of circumstantial evidence answers the panchsheel principles of Sharad Birdhichand Sarda (supra). The appellant was rightly convicted by the Trial Court and his conviction has rightly been maintained by the High Court. This part of the submissions on behalf of the appellant stand rejected.", the court said.

The court thereafter considered the issue whether death sentence be maintained or substituted by any other sentence. In its judgment, the bench has summarised the evolution of legal position and norms for dealing with the question of sentencing in such matters and the connotations of 'special reasons' for awarding death sentence. The court observed thus:

"It could readily be seen that while this Court has found it justified to have capital punishment on the statute to serve as deterrent as also in due response to the society's call for appropriate punishment in appropriate cases but at the same time, the principles of penology have evolved to balance the other obligations of the society, i.e., of preserving the human life, be it of accused, unless termination thereof is inevitable and is to serve the other societal causes and collective conscience of society. This has led to the evolution of 'rarest of rare test' and then, its appropriate operation with reference to 'crime test' and 'criminal test'. The delicate balance expected of the judicial process has also led to another mid-way approach, in curtailing the rights of remission or premature release while awarding imprisonment for life, particularly when dealing with crimes of heinous nature like the present one"

The court noted that both the Trial Court as also the High Court have taken the abhorrent nature of crime alone to be the decisive factor for awarding death sentence in the present case. In this regard, the court observed:

"The approach of the Trial Court had been that the accused-appellant was about 33-34 years of age at the time of occurrence and was supposed to be sensible. The Trial Court would observe that 'if such heinous crime is committed by him, it is not justifiable to show any sort of mercy in the punishment.' The High Court though has made rather intense comments on the menace of rape and brutal murder of children as also on the society's abhorrence of such crime12 but has, thereafter, proceeded to confirm the death sentence with a cursory observation that there were no substantial mitigating factors and the aggravating circumstances were aplenty. .

..In other words, the impugned orders awarding and confirming death sentence could only be said to be of assumptive conclusions, where it has been assumed that death sentence has to be awarded because of the ghastly crime and its abhorrent nature. The tests and the norms laid down in the relevant decisions commencing from those in Bachan Singh (supra) seem not to have acquired the requisite attention of the Trial Court and the High Court. It would have been immensely useful and pertinent if the High Court, while taking up the question of confirmation of death sentence and making several comments in regard to the abhorrent nature of crime and its repulsive impact on society, would have also given due consideration to the equally relevant aspect pertaining to mitigating factors before arriving at a conclusion that option of any other punishment than the capital one was foreclosed. The approach of the Trial Court and the High Court in this matter while awarding sentence could only be disapproved; and we do so in no uncertain terms."

The bench therefore commuted the death sentence into that of imprisonment for life, with the stipulation that the accused shall not be entitled to premature release or remission before undergoing actual imprisonment for a period of 30 (thirty) years.

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