IT is a welcome step, albeit one that feels insufficient in its scope. The Senate last week passed a bill to abolish the death penalty for two specific offences — ie, harbouring hijackers and stripping a woman of her clothes in public — in a bid to align Pakistan’s laws with obligations made under the GSP-Plus trade agreement with the EU. A clause of the trade agreement requires Pakistan to ensure that the death penalty is reserved only for the most serious crimes. Both the aforementioned crimes will now carry the penalty of life imprisonment. The death penalty, like other punishments, always carries the risk of miscarriage of justice. That risk is much more heightened in Pakistan’s context, where flawed investigations, lack of proper sentencing guidelines and myriad other weaknesses in the criminal justice system frequently lead to miscarriages of justice. Unlike other punishments, however, death is irreversible. Capital punishment is also cruel if one considers the degradation that death row inmates are put through as part of their ‘punishment’. Their cells are among the most overcrowded and miserable in our jails; then, there is the psychological toll of waiting for one’s death.

Which is why repealing it only to the extent of two very specific types of crimes seems like a half-hearted step aimed solely at appeasing international concerns. The manner in which the bill was passed suggests that there was little consideration given to the morals and ethics of the death penalty, which, as the law minister remarked, still applies to “over 100 offences”. The treasury benches were quite clear that the changes were being made keeping the GSP-Plus in mind. Those opposed to the bill, too, seemed more interested in criticism for criticism’s sake than in creating thoughtful, well-reasoned arguments against the amendments. This suggests that attitudes towards capital punishment have not changed significantly. The current criminal justice system deals cruelty in response to cruelty, be it proven or merely alleged, instead of reflecting on how crime may be deterred better or criminals reformed. This is not how society keeps healthy. The penal system should hate the crime, not the criminal, and this entails respecting human dignity and prioritising rehabilitation and reform. In this paper’s view, the death penalty achieves none of those aims and must be abandoned. Pakistan’s penal system needs a broader, principled re-evaluation.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2025