highlights
Before the summer vacation, the Attorney General had said that he is considering the process of setting up the committee.
The Supreme Court had also directed the Center to provide ‘better data’ on issues related to the method of capital punishment.
Top Law Officer is not available, on travel. Next hearing will be after 2 weeks
New Delhi. Attorney-General R Venkataramani has written to the Center to set up a committee to review the current practice of hanging death row convicts in the country. This information was given to the Supreme Court on Tuesday.
Senior advocate Sonia Mathur, appearing for the Centre, told a bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, Justice JB Pardiwala and Justice Manoj Mishra that the Attorney General has written a letter to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs for setting up the committee and has requested it to present its suggestions in the court on the issue.
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Mathur said that the top law officer is not available, he is on a trip. Therefore the hearing can be adjourned. The Chief Justice said list it for Friday after two weeks.
Earlier, the Center had told the top court that it was considering setting up a committee to review the existing method of execution of death row convicts by hanging.
The Attorney General had said that the process related to finalizing the name for the proposed committee is on and he would be able to respond to it only after some time.
Let us inform that the bench had said that the Attorney General said that the process of setting up a committee is being considered. In view of this, we will fix a date for hearing the matter after the summer vacations.
The Supreme Court had said on March 21 that it may consider setting up a committee of experts to examine whether capital punishment is proportionate and less painful for the execution of death sentences.
The court had also directed the Center to provide ‘better data’ on issues related to the method of capital punishment.
Advocate Rishi Malhotra filed a PIL in 2017 requesting to end the current method of hanging for capital punishment. They have instead urged the use of less traumatic methods such as ‘lethal injection, shooting, electrocution or gas chamber’.
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Tags: Attorney General, capital punishment, supreme court
FIRST PUBLISHED : July 25, 2023, 15:25 IST