Death Penalty to Kasab

AJMAL Kasab, the lone surviving terrorist from Pakistan responsible for the 26/11 strikes, has been sentenced to death. Special judge M L Tahilyani, referring to the Kandahar experience — where the NDA government had to release dreaded terrorist Azhar Masood in exchange for passengers of a hijacked plane — said a similar danger should not be left hanging over the government. “Kasab should be awarded the death penalty,” he said. Kasab has been held guilty and given death penalty for five offences, including waging war against India, terrorist activities, murder and conspiracy and life sentence on five other counts. The judge sentenced Kasab on over 25 counts for lesser offences ranging from 7 years to one month and fined him about Rs 1.9 lakh. Judge Tahilyani said that in the course of the trial, he found Kasab was mentally prepared for attacking India. “The probability of rehabilitation or reform is ruled out,” he added. The court had noticed that Kasab had voluntarily approached the Lashkare-Toiba and offered to become a Mujahideen. Kasab had travelled within Pakistan and offered himself to be trained for the terrorist outfit, which shows that there was no duress or compulsion to commit the offences, reasoned the court. The only consideration for not giving the death penalty to Kasab is his age, said the judge. But the terror attacks were systematically planned and executed with the help of modern equipment, the court noted. “Brutality was writ large,” said the judge referring to the way Kasab and his accomplice Abu Ismail fired indiscriminately at the CST station. “I don’t think words are required to describe this. The brutality could be witnessed from the faces of the witnesses in the court,” he added. “He fired indiscriminately, without any consideration of the age or sex of the passengers. Children were killed. Women were killed,” observed the court. “I attempted to prepare a balance sheet but the balance tilted totally in favour of the prosecution,” said the judge. He also observed that Kasab had shown no signs of “remorse or repentance.” Considering the circumstances, “death sentence” has to be awarded, the court held. The court also considered the rulings of the Supreme Court in the cases of Bachchan Singh versus State of Punjab, Machchi Singh versus State of Punjab and Simon versus State of Karnataka, which provide some guidelines for deciding on death penalty in the “rarest of the rare” cases. Kasab, sitting in the accused box in the court in a white pyjama-kurta and with his eyes to the floor and half his face covered with his hands, seemed to be sobbing when the court reasoned out the death penalty. He was then taken out by the police officials for a glass of water and returned in a few minutes to resume the court proceedings. The 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai left more than 160 people dead and many more injured.