New Delhi, July 16 (PTI): The Supreme Court has asked lower courts not to take “too sympathetic a view” while awarding punishment, particularly in offences against women and those involving moral turpitude.

“Undue sympathy to impose inadequate sentence would do more harm to the justice system, undermine public confidence in the efficacy of law and the society could not long endure under such serious threats,” a bench of Justices Arijit Pasayat and L.S. Panta said.

The court said this while setting aside a Madhya Pradesh High Court judgment that had halved the sentence to a Scheduled Tribe man convicted of raping a six-year-old.

The apex court restored the 10-year rigorous imprisonment slapped on Santosh Kumar by a trial court.

“It is... the duty of every court to award proper sentence having regard to the nature of the offence and the manner in which it was executed or committed,” the bench said.

The high court had reduced the sentence awarded to Santosh on the grounds that he was young and a member of a Scheduled Tribe.

But the apex court made it clear that though courts have the discretion to award a term less than the prescribed minimum sentence, it could be done only for “adequate and special reasons” and the reasons given by the high court were neither adequate nor special.

Quoting a paragraph from the verdict in the Dhananjoy Chatterjee case, the bench said: “The court must not only keep in view the rights of the criminal but also those of the victim? and the society at large.”

Chatterjee was awarded the death penalty for raping and murdering a Calcutta schoolgirl.