The Wages of Crime
Is murder ~ often seen as the ultimate crime ~ justifiable in the pursuit of a higher purpose? Is the life of a disabled person far more easily dispensable? Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment first published in instalments in 1866 is one of the best known literary works to explore these complex moral issues and the human capacity to rationalise the most debased acts. The proceedings in the South Goa District and Sessions Court on Monday offered us a defining image of crime and payback when Judge Nutan Sardessai sentenced Janardhan Kokre to life for the murder of Dilip Naik, 42, in 2011.
Kokre had kidnapped the mentally challenged Naik, killed him, decapitated and dismembered his body which he later set on fire in his jeep in Mollem, to make identification impossible. The motive ~ reminiscent of high profile insurance frauds in the West ~ was to pass off Naik’s body as his own, so his wife could collect on the 19 life insurance policies Kokre had calculatedly initiated five months ahead of the murder. Modern forensics and some good police detective work, for a change, caught up with the Ponda killer. Though defence lawyers, as is their brief to extract the maximum concessions from a court, argued that the killer deserved leniency, given he was a “first time” offender, Judge Sardessai demonstrated rightly that Kokre had no case for sympathy. Her order described “the cold and calculated manner” in which a mentally challenged man had been enticed to a very brutal and undeserving death. It was in fact the victim’s family that showed moral fibre. They said they were happy with the court’s verdict, though the accused deserved the death penalty for the barbaric and premeditated killing.
The death penalty has been much in debate in recent weeks with more political and civil society voices lobbying for harsher laws against rapists, and more particularly child rapists. On Monday, the four-year old rape victim from Gansor, Madhya Pradesh died of a cardiac arrest at the Care Hospital in Nagpur after a week in coma. Her case is the latest to weigh in on the argument that perpetrators of this debased a crime must be dealt with the most severe of punishments as a deterrent. The BJP’s Sushma Swaraj favours the death penalty for child rape. The CPM too said it was open to the idea because the recent cases showed there was something “seriously wrong” with Indian society which has little fear for the law. Those opposed to the death penalty for any form or degree of crime argue to the contrary, that taking a life for a life is neither a deterrent nor the route a civilised and progressive society should take recourse to.
The UPA government which is under immense pressure to amend the recently passed anti-rape law to include a clause under which child rapists could be awarded the death penalty, will have to weigh the many complex factors involved in this issue. One is the argument that changing the laws alone will change nothing if we do not have a police system that implements them or a judicial system that delivers justice expeditiously. Some rape cases are not booked for years. Activists have also argued that in cases where the death penalty is involved, the stringent evidence required could retard the process of justice for the victims of rape. Under the Protection of Children Against Sexual Violence Act that was passed last year, raping a child carries a jail term of seven years to life. Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code too has no provision for child rape. But given that 64 per cent of all rapes in India involve children, according to the National Crime Records Bureau, the Centre may well be moved to make the existing laws far more stringent, or even bring in the death penalty for a crime that is becoming more and more common.
