Gujarat has seen a sharp rise in trial courts giving capital punishment with 50 people being sentenced to death this year till August compared to 46 between 2006 and 2021, as per data available with courts in the state.

In February 2022, a special court sentenced to death 38 convicts in the 2008 Ahmedabad serial blasts case, sharply pushing up the number of people getting capital punishment by trial courts in the state this year.

Fifty-six people were killed and more than 200 injured in a series of blasts that ripped Ahmedabad in 2008.

Besides this case, the trial courts in different cities also sentenced convicts to death in cases of rape and murder of minors, registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.

In one of these cases, at a court in Kheda town, the accused was sentenced to death where a minor was raped and not killed.

Besides, in two cases of “honour killing” also, the accused were given capital punishment.

Apart from 13 convicts getting death sentences in different cases in 2011, the number did not exceed four between 2006 and 2021. In 2010, 2014, 2015 and 2017, no person was awarded the death sentence by trial courts in the state.

In 2011, 11 out of 13 convicts were sentenced to death in a 2002 Godhra train carnage case in which 59 people were killed.

For 16 years till 2021, Gujarat High Court upheld the punishment of only four of those sentenced to death by trial courts. These included three convicts of the 2002 Akshardham temple attack case, who were later acquitted by the Supreme Court.

High court lawyer Anand Yagnik said: “If we do not count the 2008 Ahmedabad serial blasts case conviction, the number comes to 12.”