We can save Sarabjit. We can give a positive signal by commuting the death sentence of Afzal.
"I cannot believe that to defend life and punish the person that kills, the state should in its turn kill. The death penalty is as inhuman as the crime which motivates it."
- President Eduardo Frei of Chile while commuting the death sentence in 1996
RE:We can save Sarabjit
by allan abraham on Mar 17, 2008 09:29 AM Permalink
I totally agree with you, Afzal"s sentence should be commuted and commuted at all costs , for humanity atleast.
RE:RE:We can save Sarabjit
by Pushp Shah on Mar 17, 2008 09:57 AM Permalink
In that case the Paki who went on a firing spree at Parliament house needs to be hanged immediately........no mercy to be shown to him either.
RE:RE:We can save Sarabjit
by allan abraham on Mar 17, 2008 09:32 AM Permalink
Tagthagata people like u are beasts and they only know the language of killing. People like u promote Dara singh( murderer of staines and his children) and co.
RE:We can save Sarabjit
by Ayan Nandy on Mar 17, 2008 09:32 AM Permalink
What is the crime committed by Afzal? Even the Supreme Court of India can't provide any direct evidence against him. He is a scapegoat. Look at the "media confession" in which Afzal implicated himself completely in the attack. The speed with which this happened made many of us believe that he was indeed guilty as charged. It was only much later that the circumstances under which this "confession" was made were revealed, and even the supreme court was to set it aside, saying that the police had violated legal safeguards.
From the time he was arrested up to the time he was charged (a few months), his younger brother Hilal was held in illegal confinement in a police camp in Kashmir. As ransom.
The courts relied both on Afzal's own testimony - which showed that he, a surrendered militant, brought one of the five attackers (Mohammed alias Burger) from Kashmir to Delhi and helped him purchase a second-hand car - and on circumstantial evidence, which crucially hinges on the recovery of explosives from his house and records of cellphone calls with the five militants.
Both are open to doubt. The police say that they found explosives in Afzal's house when he was in custody, but cannot satisfactorily explain why they broke into it when the landlord had the key. This puts a question-mark over the evidence. The cellphone records were all traced to a Delhi number (98114-89429), used on an instrument allegedly found on Afzal when he was arrested in Srinagar.
RE:RE:We can save Sarabjit
by Ayan Nandy on Mar 17, 2008 09:34 AM Permalink
The cellphone records were all traced to a Delhi number (98114-89429), used on an instrument allegedly found on Afzal when he was arrested in Srinagar. The instrument did not contain a SIM (Subscriber Idendity Module) card; it was identified through the IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) number (which is unique to each instrument).
But how did the police discover the IMEI number? This can only be done in two ways: you either open the instrument and read the number; or you dial a code and it is displayed. But the policeman who made the recovery said on oath that he neither opened the instrument nor operated it. (Remarkably, Jammu and Kashmir did not have a cellular network in 2001.)
It is open to doubt whether Afzal actually had the cellphone that was so crucial to establishing that he was in contact with all five terrorists. In the absence of conclusive evidence that 98114-89429 belonged to and was used by Afzal, a deep, substantive conspiracy cannot be established.
There is another grey area. The police produced a dealer who deposed that Afzal had bought the cellphone on December 14, with a new SIM card. But the police's own records show that the number was in use since November 6.
All this casts doubt on the circumstantial evidence, and warrants circumspection and caution in concluding that Afzal was involved in a deep conspiracy.
RE:RE:We can save Sarabjit
by allan abraham on Mar 17, 2008 09:36 AM Permalink
Ayan i totally agree with u. Afzal never got a fair trial, the UPRIGHT LAWYERS decided not to plead for him, And THE court DECIDED TO HANG HIM in the NATIONAL INTEREST rather than for his crime which he never committed. There was no direct evidence against him . Arundhati RAo wrote a series of convincing articles on him, which in my eyes establishes his innonence.
