India

RetentionistLegal status of the death penalty*
404Number of individuals currently under sentence of death
0Executions in 2022
0Executions in 2021
4Executions in 2020

2015Last known execution
Hanging, ShootingMethod(s) of execution
NoParty to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
NoParty to the Second Optional Protocol to the ICCPR, aiming at the abolition of the death penalty
Not applicableParty to the American Convention on Human Rights
Not applicableParty to the Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights to Abolish the Death Penalty
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2010): cosponsor
AgainstUN Moratorium Resolution (2010): vote
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2010): has signed the Note Verbale of Dissociation
NoUN Moratorium Resolution (2012): cosponsor
AgainstUN Moratorium Resolution (2012): vote
YesUN Moratorium Resolution (2012): has signed the Note Verbale of Dissociation
NoDoes the country have a mandatory death penalty?
2023-05-23Last update


Source: Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide
*Source of classification: Amnesty International

Related document(s)

Document(s)

Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics Report 2023

By Project 39A, on 15 February 2024


2024

NGO report

India


More details See the document

Published in 2023.

This is the eighth edition of the Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics Report. This annual publication presents changes in the death row population as well as political and legal developments in the administration of the death penalty in India each year. The statistics are compiled through a combination of data mining of court websites, media monitoring and Right to Information applications.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list India

Document(s)

Annual Statistics Report 2022

By Project 39A, on 22 February 2023


2023

NGO report

India


More details See the document

This is the seventh edition of the Death Penalty in India: Annual Statistics Report published by Project 39A at National Law University, Delhi. 2022 represents a significant shift in death penalty adjudication, with the Supreme Court recognising the need to reconsider the capital sentencing framework for the first time since it was laid down in Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab in 1980. In a momentous order, the Supreme Court noted the gaps in the death penalty sentencing framework and has sought to address these concerns through a Constitution Bench towards establishing the components of a real, meaningful and effective capital sentencing hearing. In another decision, the Court laid down guidelines for the collection of mitigating material by trial courts. However, in the same year that the Supreme Court cast grave doubts on the death penalty sentencing framework and its implementation by trial courts, it is of concern that 165 death sentences were imposed by Sessions Courts, the highest in a single year since 2000.

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list India

Document(s)

Death Penalty and the Indian Supreme Court (2007-2021)

By Project 39A, on 8 December 2022


2022

NGO report

India


More details See the document

Death Penalty and the Indian Supreme Court (2007-2021) maps the important trends and developments in the Supreme Court’s death penalty jurisprudence. These past 15 years have witnessed significant developments in the law on capital sentencing, post-mercy jurisprudence, and other procedural developments pertaining to the administration of the death penalty. Imagined as an intellectual successor of PUCL and Amnesty International’s doctrinal study of the Supreme Court’s death penalty cases between 1950 to 2006, in ‘Lethal Lottery: The Death Penalty in India’, this report highlights the sustained inconsistency and judge-centric reasoning in capital cases, with particular emphasis on the problem of arbitrariness in approaches to capital sentencing at the Supreme Court. 

  • Document type NGO report
  • Countries list India

Document(s)

Legislative Expansion and Judicial Confusion: Uncertain Trajectories of the Death Penalty in India

By Anup Surendranath and Maulshree Pathak, on 1 September 2022


2022

Academic report

India


More details See the document

The numbers and the politics of the death penalty in India tell very different stories, presenting complicated narratives for its future. The public reaction to instances of sexual violence and other offences over the last decade and the consequent political response has significantly strengthened the retention and expansion of the death penalty. This is reflected from the fact that that of all the death sentences that district courts impose, only about 5 percent get confirmed in India’s appellate system. However, does this mean there is growing scepticism about the death penalty in the Supreme Court of India? Unfortunately, the answer is far from simple. An assessment of the death penalty in India’s appellate courts during the last decade will demonstrate that a crime-centric approach has hindered any principled discomfort with the death penalty or the manner of its administration. In particular, the Supreme Court has faltered in high-profile death sentence cases (i.e., offences against the state and sexual violence cases), and its track record of commutations has very little to do with principled considerations on sentencing. This paper argues that the political and judicial imagination of the death penalty, as a necessary part of the response to crime, creates significant and unique challenges for the path towards abolition.
This article was first published in Crime Justice Journal: https://www.crimejusticejournal.com/issue/view/119

  • Document type Academic report
  • Countries list India
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