Death sentence of rape and murder convict commuted by Supreme Court on ground of 11-year solitary confinement

The Supreme Court on Friday commuted the death sentence of a man convicted of rape and murder, to life imprisonment on the ground that he was subjected to solitary confinement for 11 years while awaiting his fate [BA Umesh v. Union of India & Ors.].A bench of Chief Justice of India UU Lalit and Justices S Ravindra Bhat and PS Narasimha noted that the petitioner was entitled to commutation since the ill-effects of spending time alone in a cell was demonstrably shown. "Having considered the entirety of matter, in our view, the impact of solitary confinement were obviously evident in the instant case, as would be clear from the letter given by the medical professional on 6.11.2011 and the communication emanating from the jail on 8.11.2011. The incarceration in solitary confinement thus did show ill effects on the well-being of the appellant. In the backdrop of these features of the matter, in our view, the appellant is entitled to have the death sentence imposed upon him to be commuted to death sentence to life," the judgment stated.The top court had reserved its verdict in the matter on April 26 this year..The appellant in the present case, one Umesh, was a death-row convict lodged at the Belgaum Central Prison in Karnataka. He was sentenced to death in 2006 for rape, murder, and robbery. After several rounds of appeals, the top court upheld his conviction in 2011, and a three-judge bench in 2016 dismissed his review petition. His mercy petition was rejected by the President in 2013. Last year, the Karnataka High Court vacated the stay on his execution, after noting that there had been no inordinate or excessive delay on the part of the Central and State governments in deciding on his mercy plea. It had further concluded that the appellant "cannot be said to have been kept in solitary confinement"..Challenging the same, the appellant approached the top court seeking relief.His submissions were twofold: - One that there was avoidable delay to the extent of 550 days in disposing of his mercy petition;- The second was that he was kept in solitary confinement for 11 years.On the first argument, the counsel for the Central government submitted that the President and Governor had examined the appellant's medical records in deciding his clemency plea. It was contended that there is no straight-jacket formula for what constitutes an inordinate delay by the government in deciding mercy petitions. .The bench noted that when it comes to delays in deciding mercy petitions, judicial delays have never been considered as a ground. In the instant case, the Court noted that his mercy petitions were disposed of at two different levels - by the Governor and President - over a period of 2 years and 3 months. Such a period cannot be considered 'an inordinate delay', the Court said.Further, the Court noted that during that period, there was a stay on his sentence."The time taken by each of these authorities and the functionaries assisting them cannot be called or termed as “inordinate delay” and secondly, it was not as if every passing day was adding to the agony of appellant. The order of stay of execution had put the matter in a different perspective," the bench said.Hence, the first submission did not merit acceptance, the Court made it clear..On the second submission as regards solitary confinement, the apex court in April had directed the Belgaum District Judge to inspect the jail premises and in particular, the barracks where Umesh was housed. The bench wanted to be apprised of the manner in which the death-row prisoners in that jail lived.Subsequently, it was confirmed that the appellant was indeed lodged in solitary confinement after his conviction had been confirmed.Thus, on this ground the plea for commutation of death sentence was allowed and he was sentenced to imprisonment for life.The Court also said that remission of sentence will not be allowed for 30 years."If any application for remission is moved on his behalf, the same shall be considered on its own merits only after he has undergone actual sentence of 30 years. If no remission is granted, it goes without saying that as laid down by this Court in Gopal Vinayak Godse vs. State of Maharashtra, the sentence of imprisonment for life shall mean till the remainder of his life. 28. The appeal is allowed accordingly," the Court ordered..Advocates Yug Mohit Chaudhry, Siddhartha Sharma,Prabu Ramasubramaniam, Payoshi Roy, Raghunatha Sethupathy B, Priya R, and K Paari Vendhan represented the petitioner. Additional Solicitor General KM Nataraj and Senior Advocate Sonia Mathur, with advocates Khushboo Aggarwal, Prerna Dhall, Simarjeet Singh Saluja, Sughosh Subramanyam, Shailesh Madiyal, Sanjay Kumar Tyagi, Arvind Kumar Sharma, Nikhil Goel, Shubhranshu Padhi, Ashish Yadav, Rakshit Jain, Vishal Banshal, and Aditya K Roy represented the respondents. .[Read Judgment]