Low Age Of Rape Victim Is Not Considered As The Only Or Sufficient Factor To Impose Death Sentence: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court observed that the low age of the rape victim is not considered as the only or sufficient factor for imposing a death sentence.

The bench of Justices L. Nageswara Rao, Sanjiv Khanna and BR Gavai observed thus while commuting death sentence awarded to Irappa Siddappa Murgannavar who was found guilty of having subjected a five year old girl (R) to rape, killed her by strangulation, and then disposed of her body, tied in a gunny bag, into the stream named Bennihalla.

In this case, the court addressed the prosecution submission that the matter falls in the category of 'rarest of the rare' cases as the accused, under the pretext of giving biscuits, committed rape and murder of a five-year old girl, and threw her dead body into the stream.

In this context, the court referred to a recent judgment in Shatrughna Baban Meshram v. State of Maharashtra (2021) 1 SCC 596. In the said judgment, 67 judgments of the Supreme Court in the previous 40 years were surveyed wherein death sentence had been imposed by the trial court or the High Court for the alleged offences under Sections 376 and 302 of the Code, and where the age of victims was below 16 years. [in Shatrughna Baban Meshram, the court noted that the death sentence was confirmed in 12 out of 67 cases where the principal offences allegedly committed were under Sections 376 and 302 IPC and where the victims were aged about 16 years or below. Out of these 67 cases, at least in 51 cases the victims were aged below 12 years, the court had noted.]

"It appears from the above data that low age of the victim has not been considered as the only or sufficient factor by this Court for imposing a death sentence. If it were the case, then all, or almost all, 67 cases would have culminated in imposition of sentence of death on the accused.", the court observed.

The court further referred to the judgment in Bantu alias Naresh Giri v. State of Madhya Pradesh (2001) 9 SCC 615, where the appellant was accused of raping and murdering a six year old girl, the Supreme Court noted that though his act was heinous and required condemnation, but it was not rarest of the rare, so as to require his elimination from the society.  

In this case, the court said that the observation by the High Court that there are no mitigating circumstances at all is incorrect. The court noted following circumstances to commute death sentence

The appellant had no criminal antecedents, nor was any evidence presented to prove that the commission of the offence was preplanned.

There is no material shown by the State to indicate that the appellant cannot be reformed and is a continuing threat to the society. On the contrary, it can be seen from the Death Sentence Prisoner Nominal Roll dated 17th July 2017 issued by the Chief Superintendent, Central Prison, Belgaum, that the conduct of the appellant in jail has been 'satisfactory'. We would consider the appellant's conduct in prison as expiation for his past deeds, also reflecting his desire to reform and take a humane turn.

Furthermore, the young age of the appellant at the time of commission of the offence (23 / 25 years), his weak socioeconomic background, absence of any criminal antecedents, non pre-meditated nature of the crime, and the fact that he has spent nearly 10 years 10 months in prison have weighed with us as other extenuating factors, which add up against imposition of death penalty which is to be inflicted only in rarest of the rare cases.

The  State has not shown anything to prove the likelihood that the appellant would commit acts of violence as a continuing threat to society; per contra, his conduct in the prison has been described as satisfactory

The bench, therefore, partly allowed the appeal by commuting the death sentence to that of life imprisonment with the stipulation that the accused shall not be entitled to premature release/remission before undergoing actual imprisonment of 30 years.

Also from the judgment:

"Hope For Reformation & Rehabilitation": Supreme Court Commutes Death Sentence Awarded To Man Accused Of Rape & Murder Of 5 Year Old Girl

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