Droupadi Murmu Allows Rapist to be Hanged
India’s President rejects the mercy plea from a rapist and allows him to be hanged because of a brutal crime he committed. Let’s look at the details.
In India, if a citizen feels that he/she is wrongly given punishment by a lower court, he can present his case to the high court. If they are still not satisfied, they can appeal to the Supreme court. If the Supreme Court either refuses to hear the appeal or maintains the same punishment, it is final. But, in cases of death penalties, the convict or his relative can submit a mercy petition to the President of India. She holds a special power to accept the mercy plea and can waive off the death penalty.
According to the Rashtrapati Bhavan, our president Droupadi Murmu has rejected a mercy plea for the first time after she assumed office as the 15th President of India on July 25, 2022. Sampat Dupare was convicted for raping and stoning to death a four-year-old girl in Maharashtra in 2008. On November 26, 2014, this case went on in the trial court’s as well as the Bombay High Court. The decision was a death sentence to the convict.
The Supreme Court had on July 14, 2016, agreed to examine the plea of Dupare, who said that he was not given a fair chance to put forth his arguments in the trial court which sentenced him to death. Not changing the death penalty awarded to the convict, the top court had said that the rape of a minor girl was “a monstrous burial of her dignity in darkness.” The convict, who was a neighbour, lured the girl, raped her and then hit her to death using two heavy stones.
The Supreme Court had on May 3, 2017, dismissed the review petition of Vasanta Sampat Dupare (then 55 years old). Then, the President’s secretariat received a recommendation from the Union Home Ministry on the matter on 28th March 2023. The mercy petition was rejected by the President on 10th April. The status was updated on April 28, 2023.
