Srinagar, Oct 10: Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of
Civil Societies (JKCCS) today said it would present 13,748
signed petitions against the death penalty to Parliament
Attack Case convict Mohammad Afzal Guru to the UN Special
Rapporteur.
The JKCCS signature campaign to protest against death
penalty of Guru received a wide scale support and 13,748
signed petitions were collected in a week, Chairman of the
Society Pervez Imroze told reporters here on the world day
against death penalty.
Imroze said the signed petitions collected by lawyers,
doctors, academicians and students from different districts of
Kashmir would be presented to the UN Special Rapporteur on
extra judicial, summary and arbitrary executions.
The signatures would also be sent to different
International Human Rights Organisations like Amnesty
International for their indulgence, he said.
He said the basic object of the siganture campaign was
to register protest against the "failure of the Indian legal
system" in a peaceful manner.
The UN Special Rapporteur has already committed that
the defedants in the proceedings leading to imposition of
death penalty must benefit from the services of a lawyer at
every stage of proceedings, he said.
"We believe that Afzal's death penalty is within this
mandate because he met with an unfair trial," Imroze said.
Bureau Report
First Published: Tuesday, October 10, 2006, 00:00