Dhananjay, a private security guard, was sentenced to death in August, 1991 for the rape and murder of an 18-year old school girl in her apartment in Calcutta on 5 March, 1990. As there were no eye-witnesses, the case is reported to have rested on circumstantial evidence alone. Chatterjee pleaded innocent but the Supreme Court ruled that his guilt was “amply evident”. He was alleged to have committed the crime as an act of revenge after the girl complained to her parents that he was harassing her. The Supreme Court imposed the death penalty because of the “savage nature of the crime”, and held that it fell into the category of “rarest of rare” cases for which the death peanlty could be imposed. After unsuccessful appeals to both the High Court and the Supreme Court, Dhananjay Chatterjee was due to be hanged on 25 February, 1994, after which the date of execution was postponed to 4 and then 18 March, 1994, but did not take place. Dhananjay ....