India
Death penalty and prisoners' rights · Archive since 1999
Data card
- Legal status
- Retentionist
- Executions recorded in 2026
- 0
- Executions recorded in 2025
- 0
- First news item in the archive
- JANUARY 1, 1999 · The Indian legislative system also provides for different...
- News items in the archive
- 1,863
Source: Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026.
India is classified as Retentionist in the Hands Off Cain database, updated to 2026. In 2026 the association recorded 0 executions in the country, against 0 the year before. The archive holds 1,863 news items on India, from 1999 to today.
In India the death penalty applies to murder, terrorism and certain serious sexual offences, and the method is hanging. Case law restricts it to the cases it calls the rarest of the rare: many sentences are handed down, few executions are actually carried out, and a significant share of sentences is overturned or commuted on appeal.
The archive follows sentences, commutations, executions and legislative debates.
Latest news
- JANUARY 1, 1999IndiaDEATH PENALTY
The death penalty is provided for by the Penal Code...
The death penalty is provided for by the Penal Code and by Art
- JANUARY 1, 1999IndiaDEATH PENALTY
The arguments of Justice Chandrachud in Mithu v State...
The arguments of Justice Chandrachud in Mithu v State of Punjab (1983 SCC (Cr) 404) on the constitutional validity of Section 303 are extremely relevant
- JANUARY 1, 1999IndiaDEATH PENALTY
India was a cosponsor of the amendments presented by...
India was a cosponsor of the amendments presented by Egypt (A/C