Daily Times

The debate concerning defining of the term of life imprisonment in Pakistan has sparked once again. The ongoing debate has gained momentum within Pakistan because it has been seen in coming years life imprisonment will become an alternative to the death penalty. However, it is too early to predict anything like that though. It is not the first time that the honourable SC of Pakistan is contemplating on this legal point. In 2004 the then judges of SC of Pakistan considered same like legal issue before in detail. The incumbent Chief Justice of Pakistan has once again taken up a task of defining the term “Life Imprisonment”. The author will consider legal and logical elements below in tentative manner.

At present, criminal law of Pakistan provides no transparent definition of a term “life imprisonment.” However, a plain help could be taken from Section 57 of Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) 1908 to initiate an argument. Section 57 of (PPC) lays fractions of terms of punishment, imprisonment for life shall be reckoned as equivalent to imprisonment for twenty-five years. Considering Section 57 (PPC) it transpired that life imprisonment sentence is equivalent to twenty-five years in prison. Moreover, a full member bench judgement in Dilawar Hussain’s case of 2013 decided that the term life imprisonment means twenty-five years imprisonment. The full bench while reaching to conclusion that life imprisonment in Pakistan is twenty-five years in prison referred to section 57 of the PPC and rule 140 of the Pakistan Prison rules, 1978 (hereinafter referred to as prison rules).The judgement further provided under Section 401 Criminal Code of Procedure (CRPC) 1898the provincial government is empowered to commute any sentence passed by the any court of law and also grant remission in punishment to any convict subject to the condition that he has undergone fifteen years of imprisonment. It may be mentioned here that article 45 of the constitution empowers the president to grant remissions from time to time, particularly on national occasions. The law provides that the remission is applicable to convicts and not to under-trial prisoners. The legal confusion does not stop here the jail manual also provides for at least a 14-year substantive period for those sentenced to life imprisonment.

The criminal law as well as all other enabling provisions of law provided no definition on the subject of life imprisonment. This task ought to be left with the Parliament to decide and legislate on the matter

Looking at India, it transpired that in 2015, Indian SC bench comprising of honourable Justices T S Thakur and V Gopala Gowda, while dealing with the petitions of five convicts from Chhattisgarh challenging their conviction for murder, the august Indian SC asked whether life imprisonment could be truncated through remission, if the death penalty was done away with. They bench observed that instead of hanging a condemned prisoner put him in “jail for his entire life.” India. Such observations of the Indian SC appeared to occur in result of strong campaign going on against the practice of the death penalty in India. The human rights defenders and international human groups have been keeping pressure upon Indian authorities to either abolish the death penalty or place moratorium on the use of the death penalty. Indian SC in strict way, and rights groups across India have been voicing against the use of the death penalty. Even, it is noted that hangings of Azal Guru and Yaqub Memon leashed huge outcry across India, a couple of years ago. The human rights groups in Indian condemned the hangings of Azal Guru and Yaqub Memon, who were found to be guilty of terrorism and hate crimes.

It appeared the August Supreme Court of Pakistan current Chief Justice believes in literal meaning of “Life Imprisonment” which is biological death of a convict. The biological death of a convict has already been under observation in India. The CJ’s conviction expressed while hearing a petition that “convicts will prefer a death sentence instead of life imprisonment” appeared to be lethal. It is also observed during pending petition that the SC of Pakistan has been attempting to introduce an alternate to the death penalty in shape of +. biological demise of convict in prison terms as life imprisonment. The author believes that defining of term life imprisonment is to be left with the Parliament. As highlighted above that the criminal law as well as all other enabling provisions of law provided no definition on the subject of life imprisonment. This task ought to be left with the Parliament to decide and legislate on the matter. It has to be kept in our minds that introduction of biological death of a convict in Pakistan will lead prisons to brutality and violence.

The writer is an advocate based in Lahore