INDIA: PRESIDENT COMMUTES DEATH SENTENCE OF 3 MORE PRISONERS

In India, Home Minister P Chidambaram told his monthly press conference that the death sentence of three more prisoners, including a man convicted for rape and murder of a five-year-old girl, were commuted to life imprisonment by President Pratibha Devisingh Patil.
The death sentences of Satish, Karan Singh and Kunwar Bahadur Singh of Uttar Pradesh were considered under Article 72 of the Constitution and were commuted into imprisonment for life.
Article 72 gives power to the President to grant pardons, reprieves, respites or remissions of punishment or to suspend, remit or commute the sentence of any person convicted of any offence.
Satish was convicted for rape and murder of a five-year-old girl. Whereas, Karan Singh and Kunwar Bahadur Singh were sentenced to death for brutally killing five persons of a family.
On 29 April, President Pratibha Patil of India had commuted the death sentence of a domestic help, Om Prakash of Uttarakhand, who had murdered a retired Brigadier and his two family members, to life imprisonment.