Reforming the Sentencing Policy in India: A Critical Study of Punishment, Proportionality, and Judicial Discretion

Abstract

India is among the few major criminal justice systems that prescribe punishments in statute yet offer almost no structured guidance on how courts should choose between them. Penal provisions fix an outer limit, and sometimes a floor, but the actual determination of sentence rests largely on the unstructured discretion of individual judges. This article critically examines that arrangement. It traces the theoretical foundations of punishment, assesses the constitutional principle of proportionality, reviews the leading judicial pronouncements on capital and life sentences, and evaluates the effect of mandatory minimum sentences. It argues that the absence of a statutory sentencing framework has produced inconsistency, opacity and, in capital cases, arbitrariness that the Supreme Court itself has acknowledged. The article concludes by proposing a calibrated reform: a statutory Sentencing Commission, structured guidelines that preserve judicial discretion within reasoned bounds, a mandatory and separate sentencing hearing, and the rationalisation of mandatory minimums.