Life in prison bigger punishment: Madras HC commutes death sentence of man who raped daughter

The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court recently commuted the death penalty of a man convicted for sexually assaulting his minor daughter [State of Tamil Nadu Vs Murugan]..A division bench of Justice N Anand Venkatesh and Justice K K Ramakrishnan instead sentenced the man to imprisonment for life."Life imprisonment until death is a more enduring retributive measure than the finality of the gallows," the Court said.In an order passed on April 7, the Court held that keeping the convict alive to face a "lifelong dialogue with his own conscience" serves the ends of justice better than execution. The court noted that the convict, Murugan, is already living in a state of stark isolation, having been completely abandoned by his family and community."He exists in a condition of stark isolation—cut off from family, village, and society at large. This condition, akin to a living exile, is not a mere incidental hardship but a continuing and severe form of punishment," the Court noted.Hence, it sentenced the convict to imprisonment for the rest of his life. The convict shall not be eligible for premature release, remission or further commutation and should remain incarcerated until his death, the Court made it clear..Murugan was the sole accused in a case involving the repeated aggravated penetrative sexual assault on his 14-year-old biological daughter. The prosecution established that Murugan took advantage of his wife’s absence to exploit the victim’s vulnerability and loneliness. The victim deposed that she was subjected to sexual assault on more than twenty occasions..The abuse came to light when the victim's mother noticed physical changes in her daughter and took her for medical evaluation on February 5, 2025. Medical examinations confirmed the girl was approximately five months pregnant. Following legal formalities, the victim underwent a medical termination of pregnancy. DNA analysis later conclusively established Murugan as the biological father of the fetus..A special court under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO Act) convicted Murugan for aggravated penetrative sexual assault under Section 6 of the POCSO Act and sentenced him to death on January 5, 2026. The trial judge found that the accused, being the biological father, had committed a revolting breach of trust by sexually assaulting his 14-year-old daughter on more than twenty occasions, leading to her pregnancy. It imposed death penalty on Murugan, citing the extreme nature of the crime and the irreparable physical and psychological trauma inflicted upon the minor.The judge further observed that such an offender was a menace to society and that any sentence less than death would be inadequate to meet the ends of justice..The High Court engaged in an extensive philosophical critique of the death penalty, arguing that capital punishment often ends the sentence too quickly for true justice to be served."It is clear that the death penalty is final, immediate, and irreversible. It extinguishes not only life but also the possibility of repentance, remorse, or moral transformation...Where the death penalty closes the book, life imprisonment forces the offender to read every page, again and again, for the rest of their natural existence."On life imprisonment, Court said that it will compel the offender to live with the consequences of his actions. "It condemns the convict to a ceaseless confrontation with his crime, a lifelong dialogue with his own conscience, an unending expiation in the solitude of incarceration. It compels the offender to live with the consequences of his actions, to endure the passage of time within the confines of incarceration, and to confront, day after day, the weight of his crime.".The Court also held that the case did not meet the "rarest of rare" threshold required for death penalty since there was lack of evidence regarding collateral physical cruelty. While the sexual assaults were "revolting," the bench pointed out that there was no evidence of the accused physically beating or assaulting the victim outside of the sexual acts.The Court reasoned that the absence of additional physical torture meant the convict was not beyond the possibility of "living expiation.".The High Court also identified significant lapses in the original trial and further opined that the trial judge was influenced by emotion, sentiment and the horror of the offence.It found that the state had failed to prove the convict was beyond the possibility of reform, a prerequisite for the death penalty..While the court affirmed the conviction, it modified the sentence to life imprisonment for the remainder of the appellant's natural life. .The convict was represented by advocate R Manickam..The State was represented by advocates Hasan Mohammed Jinnah and Antony Sahaya Prabhakar.Other respondents were represented by advocates S Arun Pandi and P Jeba Malar..[Read Judgment]