A Parliamentary Standing Committee has favoured the death penalty for hijackers as it was “the need of the hour and unavoidable in the heightened threat of such a daring crime”. It has called for an amendment to the 1982 Anti-Hijacking Act to include capital punishment.
The report of the Standing Committee on Transport, Tourism and Culture on the Anti-Hijacking (Amendment) Bill 2010, headed by Sitaram Yechury of CPI (Marxist), was tabled in both Houses of Parliament on Tuesday. The proposed law comes more than a decade after the 1999-hijacking of the Indian Airlines flight IC-814 to Kandahar, in which the government was forced to release jailed terrorists.
The Committee said capital punishment must be awarded to conspirators and abettors whose actions resulted in the death of hostages or security personnel. It, however, raised the question whether opportunities for negotiation or settlements might be foreclosed if the hijackers knew they would invariably get capital punishment. Similarly, the Committee said, it was unclear whether the death penalty would be applicable for hijackers who had caused fatalities or to all hijackers in general.
02/03/11 Sandeep Joshi/The Hindu
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