Even Heinous/Brutal Crimes May Not Be Rarest Of Rare: SC

A revelation.

- Sanjeev Sirohi

In a remarkable and significant judgment titled Sukhlal v The State Of Madhya Pradesh in Criminal Appeal Nos. 1563-1564 of 2018 (arising out of S.L.P. (Crl.) Nos. 9558-9559 of 2014), a three-Judge Bench of the Supreme Court comprising of Justice AK Sikri, Justice Ashok Bhushan and Justice S Abdul Nazeer on November 20, 2018 while reiterating the time-tested principle that ‘life imprisonment is the rule and death penalty is the exception’ has laid down clearly that even when a crime is heinous or brutal, it may not still fall under the rarest of rare category. It has held categorically and convincingly that, “Time and again, this Court has categorically held that life imprisonment is the rule and death penalty is the exception and even when the crime is heinous or brutal, it may not still fall under the category of rarest of rare”. Very rightly so!