Several human rights activists Friday demanded the abolishment of death penalty in India, saying that capital punishment is serving agenda of political class.
"Death penalty has not been used as a deterrent. It has rather been used for political purpose. It is serving a political agenda and cannot bring reform," said Suhas Chakma, director of Asian Centre for Human Rights..
The state must provide space to reform by abolishing death penalty, he said at a conference "Campaign Against the Death Penalty in India".
Other human rights activists were also supported the demand.
"Death penalty is arbitrary, biased and unfair because use of rarest of the rare cases is not consistently applied," said Shailesh Rai, a senior researcher at Amnesty International India.