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The reform theory is the most popular theory today. It holds that the
proper aim of criminal procedure is to reform the criminal so that he may
become adjusted to the social order. This theory is in fact a mixture of
sentimental and utilitarian motives.
With the fading of faith in inflicting pain and with the spread of humane
thought, belief in re-educating the criminal to enable him to become a
useful member of society developed.
Even from the strictest economic point of view, individual men and women
are considered to be the most valuable assets of any society. It is therefore
better to save them for a life of usefulness rather than punish them by
imprisonment.
Punishment has its limitations: (1) It may produce harmful effects in the
criminals who are punished. There remains the possibility of serious
damage to the personality of the offender. With bitterness in his heart, he
may seek an opportunity to strike back at society. (2) It may label the
offender not only a criminal in his own eyes but also in the eyes of the
community.
Thus stigmatised, a man may be psychologically isolated from law-abiding
groups and again be driven into the association of criminals upon his
release from prison. (3) Punishment may also cause a person to develop
caution and unusual skills, so that he could protect himself from
apprehension, conviction and imprisonment.
It is, therefore, necessary that punishment is replaced by some alternative
so that an offender might preserve his self-respect and renew loyalties for
group standards. Criminologists have, as a result, started talking of
reformation and rehabilitation of offenders.
Reformation must involve change of environment which makes a person
criminal reducing his personality adjustments, and create barriers in the
inculcation of the principles of good citizenship.
Such a programme may even require restriction of liberty and curtailment
of rights and privileges. In other words, the reformative procedure must
not be so pleasant as to encourage further criminal activities but it must
be so designed as to produce desirable changes in the personalities of
offenders.
The propounders of reformative theory like Bentham (Rationale of
Punishment, 1830: 21), Ewing (The Morality of Punishment, 1929: 5), and
Hart (Punishment and Responsibility, 1968:10) rejected the retributive and
Even the records of special reformatories for young offenders show that it
is fully possible to reform delinquents and criminals so that they will stay
reformed for any length of time. The analogy of the criminal law to
medicine breaks down.
The surgeon can determine with a fair degree of accuracy when there is an
inflamed appendix or cancerous growth so that by cutting it out he can
remove a definite cause of distress.
There is no such physician in our complex social system who can readily
point out one cause of crime on the basis of similarly verifiable knowledge
which can be easily removed. Ignoring this question, we may ask another
question: to what extent can criminals be re-educated or re-socialised so
that they can live useful lives? Do we not know our limitations with regard
to answering this question?
Can we really deal with that group which determines the morals of its
members which ultimately provokes some to commit crimes? And here we
must not neglect the question of cost.
If poverty and unemployment are the main causes of many crimes, can we
afford the cost of removing these causes? (The expense in punishment on
the other hand is not unlimited.) Suppose a correctional institute gets
success in reforming deviants and criminals.
Will people provide funds for such correctional institutes when honest lawabiding people cannot get adequate hospital facilities? Suppose a prison
submits a plan that it requires several lakhs of rupees on a concurrent
basis every year to provide specific type of vocational education to
prisoners which will help them in economic rehabilitation after release
from prison.
Would our community stand for such expense when so many promising
young people remain unemployed? Will people be satisfied to see a
criminal convicted of a dangerous crime simply reformed and not express a
feeling of resentment against such criminal?
On all these grounds, should we accept the reformative ideal and totally
forget the punitive aspect of crime? It is, however, not easy to give a clearcut opinion on how to deal with criminals.
Perhaps, punishment policy for some and reformative policy for some other
criminals would be a pragmatic path. It is, thus, clear that punishment
cannot be abolished and correction cannot be ignored in dealing with
delinquents of differential types.
Shubham Srivastava.