BEHIND THE VIEW

Was Afzal Guru death sentence justified? Yes he was a criminal, a convict of Parliament Attacks 2001 who deserved harsh punishment. But why his death sentence pointed at the loopholes in our jurisdiction. If he was a criminal, why wasn’t he given a fair trial?

 Guru was one of the accused in the case of assault on the Parliament on 13 December 2001. He was sentenced to death in 2002 and his execution was to be carried out on October 2006 but remained on the death row. His mercy petition, which was pending with the President for long was finally rejected and even before the family of Afzal Guru could get a chance to appeal against the turning down of plea for clemency, Guru was hanged. My question is why a man who was declared a convict, given a sentence to death was kept waiting for his death. It’s not less than a living hell to see your death the every other day.

His family was not even informed of his hanging on time. As per home minister his family was informed a day before execution while the letter reaches the family on Monday long after Afzal’s hanging. However the system later reasoned this much secrecy being a part of security and safety. Even the sources said the Prime Minister told the home minister that it was alright to be tough on terror but the delay in informing Guru's family was not how "state craft" is conducted. The question rises here is were Afzal Guru’s wife and son equally deserved to share the abhorrence meant for Afzal Guru? Was it a justifiable act of humanity? Later, his family was not handed over his body but buried at Tihar jail. What a dead Afzal had possibly done against the court or parliament.

He confessed that he facilitated the plan for the money. He also cried over how he was forced to confess things he didn’t do. Even if he did all things he was made to confess, why and how could possibly a criminal tensed the handlings of the law and order?

The question is not whether his hanging was a justified punishment for his doings but it is why the man wasn’t given a lawyer who could actually enlighten his side. If he did a crime as we all know, he would have anyhow ended up getting a fair punishment. In their petition to the President of India, many social activists and academics point out “The fact that the Court appointed as amicus curiae (friend of the court) a lawyer in whom Afzal had expressed no faith; the fact that he went legally unrepresented from the time of his arrest till his so-called confession, the fact that the court asked him to either accept the lawyer appointed by the Court or cross examine the witness himself should surely have concerned you while considering his mercy petition.”

Thus, was it just the Afzal Guru’s case or every other case goes through such delicacies of jurisdiction? Whether a criminal or an innocent does it anyhow hide the loopholes of the so called law and order? Take someone else’s case and think, have you neglected such apertures of the law and order?