In 2013, the Supreme Court had asked Law Commission to examine whether death penalty is deterrent punishment or is retributive justice or the one which serves an incapacitate goal.
In its report in 2015, the then Law Commission of India, headed by Justice A P Shah, had proposed the abolition of capital punishment for non-terrorism cases, following which the ministry had sought comments from state governments.
Of the 14 states and Union Territories that have replied to the Home Ministry on a proposal to abolish the death penalty, only two, Karnataka and Tripura, want the practice to be done away with.
The states/UTs that vetoed abolition of capital punishment were Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Bihar, Tamil Nadu and Delhi.