NEW DELHI -- The recent execution of serial husband-killer Betty Lou Beets in Texas has been condemned by human rights institutions in many countries. They find it strange that the United States, which calls itself a champion of human rights, should resort to something as barbaric as capital punishment. More than 75 people were executed there last year, and this brackets it with countries like China and Russia.

If Beets' death caused outrage in much of Europe, it has certainly added fire to a debate in India. Its central law minister, Ram Jethmalani, said last week that the death sentence had failed as an instrument of prevention. Hard-core criminals were no longer afraid of being sent to the gallows.

In fact,even the widows of the late Indian Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi (murdered many years ago), and the Australian missionary, Graham Staines (burned alive some months ago in the eastern Indian state of Orissa), declared that they would not want the guilty to face death.