The Supreme Court has upheld the conviction of a man found guilty of the rape and murder of a six-year-old girl, but commuted his death sentence to life imprisonment. The commutation applies the settled ‘rarest of rare’ framework, under which the death penalty is reserved for the most exceptional cases after weighing aggravating and mitigating circumstances. The Court’s detailed reasons will be known once the judgment is uploaded.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court has commuted to life imprisonment the death sentence imposed on a man convicted of the rape and murder of a six-year-old girl in Madhya Pradesh, upholding his conviction while holding that the case did not call for capital punishment [Waris v. State of Madhya Pradesh].
A Bench of Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Sandeep Mehta and Justice Vijay Bishnoi upheld the conviction but commuted the sentence of death to one of life imprisonment.
The case
The appellant was convicted by the Special Court under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act at Jaora in December 2018, under provisions of the Indian Penal Code dealing with rape, murder and causing disappearance of evidence, and under Sections 5 and 6 of the POCSO Act. The trial court sentenced him to death under Sections 376AB and 302 IPC. The Madhya Pradesh High Court subsequently upheld both the conviction and the death sentence, following which he appealed to the Supreme Court.
The prosecution’s case, as accepted by the courts below, rested on the testimony of the child’s mother, medical evidence and DNA evidence. The conviction has now been affirmed by the Supreme Court; it is the sentence alone that has been altered.
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The ‘rarest of rare’ framework
The commutation turns on the sentencing framework the Supreme Court has developed for capital cases. Under Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab and Machhi Singh v. State of Punjab, the death penalty may be imposed only in the “rarest of rare” cases, and only after a court weighs the aggravating circumstances of the crime against the mitigating circumstances relating to the offender, and satisfies itself that the alternative of life imprisonment is unquestionably foreclosed. The framework was further structured in Shankar Kishanrao Khade v. State of Maharashtra into the “crime test”, the “criminal test” and the “rarest of rare test”.
The High Court, applying those tests, had concluded that the case fell within the rarest-of-rare category and had confirmed the death sentence. The Supreme Court, while affirming the finding of guilt, has taken a different view on sentence, holding that the extreme penalty of death was not warranted and that the ends of justice would be met by life imprisonment. The precise reasoning, and whether the life term carries any fixed minimum period without remission, will be clear from the full judgment, which is awaited.
Why it matters
The decision reflects the Supreme Court’s consistent approach that the confirmation of a conviction for even a grave and abhorrent crime does not automatically entail the death penalty. Sentencing in capital cases is a separate exercise from the determination of guilt: the court must independently assess whether the case is among the rarest of rare, giving due weight to mitigating factors and to the possibility of reformation, before concluding that the convict must be put to death rather than imprisoned for life. Appellate commutation of a death sentence to life imprisonment, while upholding the conviction, is the mechanism through which that separate assessment is given effect.
Such commutations do not diminish the seriousness of the offence or the finding that it was committed; the convict remains guilty and will serve a life sentence. What they reflect is the demanding threshold the law sets before the State may take a life in return, a threshold that the Supreme Court, in a line of decisions, has insisted must be applied with care and cannot be presumed satisfied merely because the crime is heinous. The commutation here leaves the conviction intact while substituting the sentence the Court considered proportionate and lawful.
The full judgment, once available, will set out the aggravating and mitigating circumstances the Court weighed and the reasons for its conclusion that the case did not meet the rarest-of-rare standard. Until then, the position is that the conviction stands affirmed and the death sentence stands commuted to life imprisonment.
Case Title: Waris v. State of Madhya Pradesh [Crl. A. No. 429-430/2020]
Bench: Justice Vikram Nath, Justice Sandeep Mehta and Justice Vijay Bishnoi, Supreme Court of India
Status: Conviction upheld; death sentence commuted to life imprisonment applying the “rarest of rare” framework. Detailed reasons awaited with the judgment.
This report concerns a sensitive matter involving a child victim of sexual violence, whose identity is protected by law and has not been disclosed. If you or someone you know needs support, the police helpline 112, the childline 1098 and the women’s helpline 181 can direct you to assistance.