Journal of Psychiatry

A study on sentencing behaviour of practicing judges in the lower courts in India

4^th Euro-Global Congress on Psychiatrists & Forensic Psychology

November 10-11, 2016 Alicante, Spain

G S Bajpai

National Law University, India

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Psychiatry

Abstract:

It is increasingly being seen that judges tend to differ remarkably while delivering the sentence in similar offences. There are not enough empirical evidences to suggest as to what makes a judge to award differing offences in smaller offence. It is observed that the judges may have a very liberal to a very strict stand in certain categories of offences. Lately, the judges in India have shown a greater tendency to award strict punishment on a crime against women. From the view point of forensic psychology, it is highly interesting to note whether the factors relevant to law are detrimental in shaping such behaviour of judges or there are personality cum environment based factors which may be at play for this kind of outcome. The main idea to study this issue is based on the hypothesis that the personality and ideological leaning of a judge become an important factor in the kind of sentence awarded by him. The present paper will take a sample of around 50 decided cases with regard to women and children and other violent offences for the purpose of comparison to study, whether the cases were purely decided on the merit of evidence of law or the judges vary significantly on account of their personal characteristic, background, place of origin, belief system and other psychological correlates.

Biography :

Email: gsbajpai@gmail.com