A Click Into The Future.

        For The Sake Of Argument catches up with Tejaswini Ranjan, Co- Founder of Click Internship, as she opens up about what makes Click Internship click.

Q) How did the idea initially come up? When was it (year)? How many people were initially involved?

-The idea is very simple, to create the largest website for legal internships in India. It came up in 2013. Initially, five people were involved; four founding members (Anuj Tiwari, Gaurav Singh, Shambhavi Mishra and Tejaswini Ranjan) and the mentor. Niteesh Kumar Upadhyay mentored us all through the process.

Q) Why name it Click Internship?

- Click indicates connection, and the website is all about internships. We found both the words fitting together exclusively. Click Internship is appealing too.

Q) Were people around initially convinced about the idea?

- Yes. (The secret for our energy.) People around have been supportive all-round the process. Our mentor (founder of knowledge steez) channeled us all through the process and helped us to advance the team and the website.

Q) There are already a few sites which deal with the same topic. Do you see them as competition or collaborators?

- Evidently, the other sites are competitors to Click Internship.

 Q) What were the primary problems faced while starting?

- College schedule was the leading problem we were facing at the primary stage. We are still facing it.

Q) Any advertisement problems?

- Facebook has been the chief mode of advertisement for us. We are looking for other options too.

 Q) How do you balance college and your passion?

- A balance has to be maintained. We had this in our mind while we were working on this endeavor.  Till now, we have efficaciously done our work in our best effort.

Q) Current Problems?

- Academic schedule is a problem. But, now the Click Internship team has been developed. We have prepared a proper circulation regarding the work to be done by our team members.

Q) Where do you see yourself one year from now?

-Click internship targets to be recognized the major legal internship site in India. The acknowledgement is aimed both in terms of number and worth.

Q) Is Click Internship going to be a specialist internship site or are there plans to diverse in the future?

-Click Internship is going to be a specialist legal internships site. We don’t have any divergent and deviating plans, as of now. 

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‘Is Death Penalty a suitable punishment?’

 1. COST

Many opponents present, as fact, that the cost of the death penalty is so expensive (at least $2 million per case), that we must ironically choose life without parole ('LWOP') at a cost of $1 million per year for an average of 50 years. Justice for all estimates that LWOP cases cost $1.2 million - $3.6 million more than equivalent death penalty cases. There is no apodictic proof that the upfront costs of the death penalty are significantly higher than for equivalent LWOP cases.

Edwin Sutherland in his book titled Criminology, wrote:
"It is not cheaper to keep a criminal confined, because most of the time he will appeal just as much causing as many costs as a convict under death sentence. Being alive and having nothing better to do, he will spend his time in prison conceiving of ever-new habeas corpus petitions...”

Annual cost increases are based upon: 1) prison costs, 2) medical costs, including the immense cost of geriatric care associated with LWOP; 3) injury or death to the inmate by violence; 4) injury or death to others caused by the inmate. 5) the risk and the perceived risk of escape; and 6) the justifiable lack of confidence by the populace in our legislators, parole boards and judicial system, that is, the possibility that a violent inmate will be released upon society. It can be said that points 1-5 are incurred by death row inmates too, but the difference is that they will average 6 years’ incarceration vs. 50 years for LWOP convicts.

Also, in the U.S a study called “The Death Penalty and Plea Bargaining of Life Sentences”, found that to repeal death penalty laws did not see a significant savings in trial costs. In states where the death penalty is the maximum punishment, a larger number of defendants are willing to plead guilty and receive a life sentence. The greater cost of trials where the prosecution does seek the death penalty is offset, by the savings from avoiding trial altogether in cases where the defendant pleads guilty.

 Lastly, the cost for justice does not have to be so if appeals are only allowed where they are relevant in proving one's innocence and eliminate those used merely as delaying tactics, there would be finality of trial and it would save millions in taxpayer money.

2.      RETRIBUTION

People often associate capital punishment with the ‘an eye for an eye’ concept. This is not entirely wrong. But a more appropriate term would be RETRIBUTION. Yes, retribution and not revenge, as some would tend to call it. Retribution is the primary purpose of just punishment.  The underlying principles behind retribution are that:

·         all guilty people deserve to be punished

·         only guilty people deserve to be punished

·         and that the punishment must be in proportion to the severity of their crime

This argument states that real justice requires people to suffer for their wrongdoing in a way appropriate for their crime, and in the case of murder, what their crime deserves is death. The measure of punishment in a given case must depend upon the atrocity of the crime, the conduct of the criminal and the defenceless and unprotected state of the victim. Imposition of appropriate punishment is the manner in which Courts respond to the society's cry for justice against criminals and an attempt for the victim’s families to turn the page.  

The sophomoric argument of asking: "Why do we kill people to show people that killing people is wrong?" That “two wrongs do not make a right”, amounts to treating executions and murders as equivalent. Our answer to this is that murder is defined as the UNLAWFUL killing of a person with malice aforethought. It follows therefore, that the word “murder” simply cannot be used to describe executions since the death penalty is but the application of the law and a sentence of a Court of Justice. Comparing executions to murders is like comparing imprisoning people to kidnapping.

A cliché argument used by opponents to capital punishment is the futility of combating violence with more "violence," that “you can't fight fire with fire”. But there is a difference between violence and punishment. Law enforcement and punishment is to crime what water is to fire. Fire-fighters spray water on a burning building with such force that the flames have no choice but to back down.

What separates crime from punishment, good from evil, are not their physical aspects but rather their moral aspects, what we call in Criminal Law the mens rea. Just because two practices share a physical similarity doesn’t mean that they are morally identical. Moral aspects examine the intention and motivation behind one's actions. Abolitionists tend to focus on the death penalty's physical aspects to demonstrate that it is the same as murder while completely ignoring its moral aspects. Executing someone is not killing someone for the sake of killing, like might be the case in murder, but to show the person that his atrocious crimes will not go unpunished – he simply cannot walk away, and that any wrong he has caused, a similar level of harm will be imposed on him.

Human rights activists would argue the right to life. But the way we see it, when you take the life of someone else, YOUR right to life ends with his. If you show no respect for sacred human life, then why should the State show respect for YOUR life?

By- Deena Bhoyroo

Middlesex University ( Mauritius Branch)

Sources:

PRO DEATH PENALTY WEBPAGE, <http://www.wesleylowe.com/cp.html#life>

BBC, <http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/capitalpunishment/. 

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