"Death sentence prevents replacement of the erroneous pages of the book. This is applicable not only to the common man, but also to dictators like Saddam Hussein," he said.

All India Anna Dravida Munnethra Kazhagam supremo Jayalalithaa also condemned the sentence. In a statement, she said the sentence was a gross travesty of justice. "This is a rigged verdict delivered by a puppet court after a farcical trial, which has made a mockery of the judicial process.

No other outcome could be expected from a court set up by the United States in an occupied country.

The democratic world has noted with dismay that several defence lawyers were mysteriously murdered and the Chief Judge was changed twice during the course of the trial," she said.

The Centre should strongly condemn the "sordid miscarriage of justice in unequivocal terms. The judgment cannot be acceptable to anyone who believes in freedom and justice," she said.

Shocked and grieved by the death sentence handed down to former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, people living on the 'Saddam beach' near Malappuram protested the Iraqi tribunal's verdict to hang their 'hero'.

About 50 men of the tiny fishing hamlet close to Parappanangadi town in the district took out a march on Sunday night, denouncing the verdict slapped on the deposed leader.

"The protest was spontaneous. The news was really shocking and we don't have to wait for a call from somebody to register our anger," a villager said.

The area came to be known after the Iraqi leader ever since a signboard appeared on a shanty bus shelter bearing the name 'Saddam beach' during the Iraq-Kuwait war in 1992.

Mounting pressure on the government to take a strong stand on death sentence given to Saddam Hussain, the Communist Party of India on Monday asked it to reject outright the tribunal's verdict and demand that the judgement be revoked.

"The government of India has been very mild in its initial reaction. It must now come out with an outright rejection of the tribunal's verdict and demand that the death sentence be cancelled," the CPI central secretariat said in a statement in New Delhi [Images].

Asking its state units to organise protests against the sentence, it said the US "occupation army" set up the "so-called" tribunal, which awarded the death sentence after a "charade of a trial".

Even independent observers like a former US attorney general have called this exercise as "a farce of a trial", the CPI said, adding that the verdict amounted to "judicial assassination under the shadow of army occupation and a puppet government".

The CPI said "it can only further divide and break up the Iraqi people and the nation and unleash a civil conflict with a fallout in the entire West Asia". The CPI (M) had on Sunday termed the sentence as "rigged" and asked the UPA government to intervene to get the verdict rescinded.

"This is a rigged verdict delivered after a farcical trial," it said noting that some of the lawyers representing Saddam Hussein were murdered and the chief judge was changed twice in the course of the trial.

The party asked the UPA government to categorically condemn "this judicial travesty. It must intervene to get this sentence rescinded."