For the simple reason that capital punishment is a violent punishment and for the state to resort to capital punishment is to legtimise the use of violence as a means to an end – which is what the terorrist does as well.
For the simple reason that hanging Afzal will only give the terrorists a martyr to idolise.
For the simple reason that speedy justice, not capital punishment, reduces crime, and this has been proved by studies all over the world.
For the simple reason that a lynch mob mentality is not the sign of a civilised society.
For the simple reason, as Asif of Indian Muslims puts it, “No human being has the right to decide whether the other is worth living in the world or not. No court or a collective body of people have the right to decide whether a person should live in this world or not, whatever the ground be… “
For the simple reason, as Praful Bidwai points out in Tehelka, Afzal’s crime was aiding the attack, which is not punishable by capital punishment under the law he was booked with, POTA.
For the simple reason that such voices will gain greater ground in a land that India treats as a piece of real estate: “Without going into the truth or falsity of such a case, if the alleged remote link of Afzal Guru in the attack deserves capital punishment, what should be the punishment for that establishment which has consistently and persistently snatched the democratic rights of a whole nation over the past sixty years?”
Background info: The Hindu, Business Line, Tehelka
Related posts: The great simplifiers, Nadita Haskar’s statement, Anoop Saha, Afzal’s wife’s explanation
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Agree with you there, Comrade.
Two recent cases of clemency have come from the relatives of victims. Sonia Gandhi, president of the Congress, now in power in India, secured clemency for Nalini, one of the four sentenced to death for the murder of Rajiv Gandhi, a former Prime Minister. Rajiv was Sonia’s husband.
Gladys Staines, widow of the Australian missionary, Graham Stewart Staines, who was burnt alive with his two sons, has recommended clemency for their murderers.
We are trying to deceive ourselves by imagining reducing violence automatically makes our times ‘more civilised’.
War and Police action against internal dissent (naxalism) have already legtimised violence. Capital punishment will not turn us into a barbarian society. For all our compassion, collectively, we are still barbarians.
What Bush has done to the ‘civilian casualties’ in order to ‘defend freedom’ has given more power to the use of violence than the number of prisoners executed in the USA.
Perhaps we overestimate the power of perceived martyrdom. Osama did what he did without needing martyrs to guide him along the way.
It comes down to protecting the the existence of the state (in it’s ideological entirely). That is the reason people live in groups – to protect themselves (and the group, as long as they are a part of it) against aggressors (external or internal).
If it is established beyond doubt that someone committed a crime like Afzal did, then kill him.
Point me to a civilised society. What do you mean by ‘civilised’? Physically mild(er) than some other ‘barbarian society’?
We’re disguising the survival of the fittest here, and pretending it does not exist. The concept ‘Justice’ is convenient to the existence of a group. We might not go around killing people for sport or self-protection, but we no less animal-ish for it.
On Why Afzal Deserves the Noose
Having read your all too simplistic reasons for Mohammed Afzal not to be hanged, I thought some simple reasons to the contrary also ought to be put forth for a clear perspective to the uninitiated and the as yet unbiased.
True, that the capital punishment is a violent act in itself, but what is also true is that the entire penal system is designed to dissuade the potential miscreant against taking law into his/her own hands. Penalties are imposed on those individuals who do not confirm with what is considered ‘acceptable behaviour’. The nature of the penalty imposed varies with the nature of the excess committed. So a person who is caught running the red light is let off with a fine, in case that it happened to be his first offence, whereas the same person would be awarded a heavier fine, in case he happened to be a habitual offender.
The graver the offence, the higher the penalty and the same ensures that there is always an active element of disincentive when it comes to acts of criminal nature. Going by the same logic Afzal was awarded the noose as he had committed a crime which has been aptly described by the Supreme Court as ‘one of ghastly magnitude……designed to shake the foundations of the country’s polity‘. Death when awarded after a trial is never arbitrary and never without long winding deliberation and is meant to serve as an active reminder of the consequences of the crimes committed. Far from legitimising the use of violence as a means to an end, it will serve as a reminder of the end to the means that Afzal and his cohorts adopted.
Terrorists hate us for not what we do but for what we are.Afzal and his ilk have chosen to advance the cause of a religious ideology designed to wreak havoc and death on entire populations irrespective of the fact that a majority of their victims have no role in the percieved injustices meted out to them. How many victims of the Diwali bombing of 2005 would have had anything to do with the so called ‘subjugation’ in Kashmir? How many of the victims of the Bombay blasts of 2006 had any role to play in any of the Gujarat riots? Terrorists would go on committing such acts of violence, so long as they think that they can coerce civil socities to accept their views at gunpoint. The rear guard aiding and abetting a terrorist does a great disservice to the civil society that he too forms a part of. Such acts deserve nothing short of the noose.
Terrorists are never short of Poster Boys. A while back there were blood curdling accounts of how the Indian Army was systematically using Rape as a weapon against the civilians. The Duktaran-e-Millet organised massive demonstrations against the ‘occupation forces’ and many a sermon in mosques across the Islamic world contained loaded references to the struggle against the infidels and funds were collected for ‘resistance’, with the slight inconvenient detail that all the parties concerned were ready to gloss over-that never was there any organised use of sexual crimes by the Indian Army;true there were individual acts of such crimes, and in serveral cases the offenders were brought to trial and punished often based on nothing more than the oral testimonies of the victims- the same was used to advance the ’cause’.Commuting Afzal’s sentence would only result in him being elevated to the status of Maulana Massod Azhar- another conrade whose release is to be won as a concession for sparing the lives of innocent hostage, like it happened in the case of IC 185.
Delay in the administration of justice is caused as much by the deliberate and cyincal manipulative pracatices adoted by the defence as is by the inability of an overburdened system to cope with rigours of modern day crime. However having been brought to trial six months after the atrocity and having reached the final verdict at the end of almost 4 years, any claims of of a hurried or delayed justice would fall on it’s feet.
Lynch mentality had it been exercised would have resulted in Afzal and his co-accused being done away with long ago. The very fact that one of his co-accused is now a free man points to how restrained the society has been in hte face of unprecedented onslaught by terrorists.
Asif’s views are no doubt of the highest moral standards, but I find it confusing when I am reminded of the Fatwas issued against Salman Rushdie, the Pope and the editor of an obscue Danish Newspaper- all in the name of having hurt the sentiments of the members of a religion and the almost defeaning silence by the so-callled ‘Moderate Muslim’ againsts the miseuse of their religion. Wouldn’t the same moral standards be applicable to all, including the terrrorists, and the Mullahs?
Afzal was indeed the co-conspirator in the Parliament attacks and at no point in time was he ever accused of having pulled the trigger. However, he was convicted of having waged a war against the country, a crime punishable by death.
Without caliing into quesion the political persuasions of the writer of the piece from “Greater Kashmir” and toeing his entire line of loigc without reservations, shouldn’t he be reminded that the terrorist paymasters from across the border and his co-religionist sympathisers have done more to deny the most basic of all human rights- the right to life to more individuals than the state accused of conisitently and persistenetly denying the democratic rights of the putative “nation”(Ragtags can never be called a nation) ever has!
Anything short of death for Afzal would be a gross miscarriage of justice.
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HANG THE BITCH !!
If you are suggesting that we leave the guy without a cpital punishment , then who gurantees that in the the very near future we will not be trading him with some rogue terroists in re trun for sparing innocent lives?
If the crime is so henous and the guilt is proven beyond doubt , anything less than a capital punishment would only encourage such henious crimes.
The posts before me describe their arguments very well and i dont need to add anything there.
Let spare us all of this pure play philosphicalcum morality talk about being villian if we pusnish a terrorist. gping by the orginal writers logic, evry soldier/law enforcement on this planet is equal to this terrosist beause they also “kill” . I think it’s prudent to think of the “objective” and who you are taregtiing.
there are ppl like this terrorist who are playing a no holds barred game.. eliminating innocent people..kids. WHat has the common man got to do with the so called “indian Occupation” in kashmir or whatever.
did the middle class families who died… did the kids who died..did the kids who lost there parents in such bomb blasts rape somebody or killed somebdy or were resposible for any wrong doing against those ppl who kileld them.
This is a new world. Religion as a pretext is nto the real pretext. the real cause is POWER / MONEY and related things.
Bin Laden and his gang of holligans were trained by the CIA. evryby knwos that. then y all of a sudden all non muslims (e specially the west) became the worst enemies?
Dont punsih these terrorists and someday we may not be alive to even discuss or have arguments like these.
Well said, Shivam.
For Dan: I’m glad you unabashedly believe in the omniscience and balance of our criminal justice system (I believe in the system, but am not blind to its human frailties), but the truth is – and everyone who is involved within it will tell you so – that the more heavy the penalty sought, the less likely the conviction. So you end up with a ‘justice’ system in which the maximum number of people sentenced to death are dalits or from religious minorities, or in another great democracy we love to ape, you end up with a ‘justice’ system in which over 120 people on Death Row have been found to be innocent over the past 30 years.
Just another simple reason.
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To Anasuya:
I do not believe that our justice system is in any way ‘omniscient’ or for that matter ‘balanced’.The system has been in the past, and shall be in the future, be taken advantage of by people with money/political/caste clout. However, this doesn’t preclude that the system in itself would be rendered ineffectual nor does it in any way take anything away from the fact that our ‘system’ is well intentioned and most importantly open to change, unlike, and I am only too glad to say, the self appointed theological-fascist complex that Afzal happened to be a foot soldier of.
The watchword in any criminal justice system is proportionality.Capital offences attract capital punishment, although it is only a reflection of the leniency that in a large majority of such cases the punishment awarded is mitigated by other considerations.
So far as your claims that the maximum number of people sentenced are Dalits and ‘religious minorities’, the statistic that you rely on has been challenged and the author is yet to come up with reasonable clarifications to the questions raised in that regard. However, assuming that the same were true, would that imply that the Dalits and ‘other minorities’ should be given a ‘sentencing holiday’ due to their special status?
Although fallible, unlike certain interpretors of ‘divine will’ which, by the way, Afzal espoused,our system is humane. How else could you explain the commutation of the sentences given to Guru and Shaukat? Till that day comes when we all can hopefully come up with a better system let us all keep in our minds the words of of Churchill that “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time”
afzal should be hanged. in fact he himself should do suicide since he has directly and indirectly responsible in killing innocent and unarmed people. He should ask his wife and kids to do suicide too, since they are willing to take his sins in killing innoccent hindus and driving them out of kashmir.
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This is for rajesh !
You said that Afzal should be hanged or he sould do suicide ? and on the other hand you say that he was responsible for killing Innocent hindus ? Which statement of your should be considered true? either you are a very violent person you are pretending to be innocent.I was sure that someday we have to pay the price for what we did in Gujrat and i was sure that this will backlash some day. Who is responsible for that? WE ! the hindus ! and as far as Kashmir issue goes its the Indian Army who has terrorized the region i have seen with my own eyes because i lived there go and see with your own eyes if you can.
Hi Shivam,
What do you think of Arundhati Roy’s arguments(http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20061218&fname=Arundhuti+%28F%29&sid=1). I am not in India currently and it is hard for me to tell from here what is going on.Your opinion will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
I wonder why the Indian President is delaying the case of Afzal. He should respect the verdict of Supreme Court and hang the terrorist.