Delhi Gang Rape : The Verdict Comes In Today, Parents Demand Death Sentence

A special court is likely to pronounce its verdict in the December 16 gang-rape and murder case that shook the collective conscience of the country and sparked outrage that forced the government to bring a stringent law and set up special courts.

The verdict is being closely watched as the country has seen a rise in crime against women, which, among other things is blamed on a clogged and slow-moving judicial system.

  

The four accused — Vinay, Akshay, Pawan and Mukesh — can be sentenced to death, if found guilty. Their under-aged accomplice, who has since turned 18, has been sent to a reform home for three years after a juvenile board handed down a guilty verdict on August 31.

The sixth accused, Ram Singh was found hanging in his Tihar jail cell in March.

The parents of the victim have already demanded death sentence for all the accused. They were crestfallen after the juvenile was given a mild punishment.

“Nothing short of a death sentence for all the accused will satisfy us. Only that can bring peace to our minds and to the whole country,” the victim’s father told HT.

The accused had raped the 23-year-old trainee physiotherapist and then shoved an iron rod into her body in a moving bus after assaulting her male friend, the prosecution said.

After brutalising the woman, the men threw the couple out of the bus.The woman succumbed to her injuries on December 29 at a Singapore hospital.

Winding up his arguments on the day on September 3, the day court reserved its judgment, special public prosecutor Dayan Krishnan said he had placed sufficient evidence to nail each accused. Defence though said none of the accused was on the bus and they were being framed.

The trial began on February 2, with the court charging the five accused with 13 offences, including gang-rape, murder, kidnapping, unnatural offences, attempt to murder, dacoity, destruction of evidence and conspiracy.

Proceedings against Ram Singh , considered to be the prime accused, ceased after his death on March 11.

The woman’s friend was among the 84 prosecution witnesses, all of whom stood by their statements in the court.

Her mother, the investigating officer, the magistrate who recorded the dying declaration, some policemen, doctors who treated her at the Safdarjung hospital, where she battled for life for 10 days, and DNA experts also testified during the trial.

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Unknown

- Unknown Updated at: Tuesday, September 10, 2013

No connections with Dawood - Pleads Sanjay Dutt

Sanjay Dutt, who was arrested in 1993 for illegal possession of arms and had also imprisoned for the same was putting up an appeal at the Supreme Court Of India against the lower court verdict to have six year imprisonment for illegal possession of arms and his alleged terrorist links. The actor was accused of having relationship and friendship with the Don Dawood Ibrahim. 

Sanjay Dutt in a confession statement produced to the court by his counsel Harish Salve, mentioned that he had met Dawood once for a dinner party but otherwise, he has no relationships with the Dawood and the details produced were incorrect. 

Salve argued before a bench of Justices P Sathasivam and B S Chauhan that the trial in a TADA court robbed Sanjay of the common law benefits for an accused as the anti-terror law took confessional statements as eviden-ce without seeking corrob-orative material to prove the offence.

"This was a pure and simple act of panic which should have been tried under Arms Act," Salve said, clarifying that Sanjay had never claimed that he was never ever friendly with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, the alleged mastermind of the serial blasts.

"Sanjay had said he had attended a dinner at Dawood's place but had never claimed friendship with him. Sanjay's friends in the film industry used to boast of their friendship with (gangster) Tiger Memon." added Salve. The counsel also mentioned how Bollywood was linked with underworld during the dark era and Sanjay was just a victim of panic during the hours!

"Applying provisions of TADA to evaluate the confessional statements by co-accused robbed him of the opportunity to point out the inherent contradictions in them. Had common law principle of weighing evidence been applied to Sanjay's case, he would have been absolved of all charges," Salve said.

"That is because no trace of the AK-56 rifle was fou-nd on him. What was found on him was a pistol procured in September 1992 which at best could have been a minor offence under the Arms Act," he said.

Sanjay was convicted on July 31, 2007, for possessing a prohibited weapon in a case related to 1993 Mumbai blasts and was sentenced to six years' imprisonment. He has already undergone imprisonment for 16 months and was granted bail by the apex court on August 20, 2007.

Unknown

- Unknown Updated at: Wednesday, August 15, 2012