Several speakers at a seminar held here on Saturday strongly opposed death penalty in the country and wanted its repeal.
Human Rights Forum leader S Jeevan Kumar said the courts should not be emotional like individuals and impose death for death as penalty. Individuals may take revenge but courts should give an opportunity to the accused to reform himself. The right to life was enshrined in the Constitution and the courts should not take it away, he added.
AP Civil Liberties Committee leader D Suresh Kumar said the perception that capital punishment would reduce the crime rate was only notional. He said police encounters were delivering instant justice which was nothing but injustice. The accused too had rights and should be given an opportunity to defend themselves in the courts, he said and termed the death penalty as “judicial murder”.
HRF leaders Gorrepati Madhava Rao and K Murali, and CLMC leader Latif Mohammad Khan also spoke.