Prelude:
In 2003/2004 Sushma Tiwari, a Brahmin from UP married Prabhu Nochil, an Ezhava from Kerala. They were in love. 7 months after they got married, to erase the insult to their caste and recover their honour etc. her brother Dilip and some accomplices murdered Prabhu, his father and 2 children in their Mumbai home, and left 2 others injured. A pregnant Sushma escaped because she was visiting a relative.
Cut to Now:
Today's Hindu carries a brief story. It says:
Although the fast track sessions court in Maharashtra, and later the Bombay High Court, awarded the death penalty to Sushma's brother Dilip Tiwari and his accomplices, the Supreme Court in December 2009 reduced the sentence to 25-year imprisonment.And why did the Supreme Court reduce the sentence? Lo and behold...
The Supreme Court, explaining its decision to revoke the death sentence, said: "It is a common experience that when the younger sister commits something unusual and in this case it was an inter-caste, intercommunity marriage out of [a] secret love affair, then in society it is the elder brother who justifiably or otherwise is held responsible for not stopping such [an] affair."clap clap clap clap.... WTF! WTF WTF WTF?!! Is there some jurisprudential nuance I'm missing here?
It added: "If he became the victim of his wrong but genuine caste considerations, it would not justify the death sentence... The vicious grip of the caste, community, religion, though totally unjustified, is a stark reality."
While capital punishment is demonstrably wrong, even if the SC had reduced some non-capital punishment in this case [added 2010-03-08 11:50 a.m. IST]for the reasons it lists[added ends], it would have been just a mega WTF.
I hope someone is doing him a favour and sending Ajmal Kasab this vital piece of information. Here is a sentence to get him started:
"If I became the victim of my wrong but genuine religious and patriotic considerations, it would not justify the death sentence... The vicious grip of religion and nationalism, though totally unjustified, is a stark reality." etc.
If only somehow the Delhi High Court of IPC Section 377 fame was promoted en masse into the upper echelons of the country's judiciary...
Can this blog post be construed as contempt of court? Nevertheless WTF ya.
6 comments:
if i tie a piece of thread to a murderer's wrist, on an auspicious day, and he gives me Rs.100 (or a large bar of chocolate) in return, does he become my brother?
Agree with the post title.
WTF, indeed! Something else that caught my eye today: http://bit.ly/9U9TBe
Also noticed that our criminal-Swamiji du jour has been booked under Section 377 among other things. The English paper says 'unnatural sex', while the Tamizh daily called it 'same-sex sex'. I guess news travels kinda slowly from Delhi.
Wot ChoxBox said.
The most convincing, comprehensive argument against the death penalty that I've read is here.
Otherwise, the SC is being disgusting. I agree.
Thats incredibly fucked up.
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