HC upholds life for rape, murder

CHENNAI: It was a predictable end to the case of a youth, who raped his own sister-in-law, and then murdered her along with her 13-month-old baby. Describing it as an act of "quivering barbarity," the Madras high court upheld Kumar's conviction in the August 2003 double-murder case, and confirmed his life imprisonment. A division bench, comprising justice P D Dinakaran and justice R Regupathi, expressed shock at the manner in which Kumar attempted to obliterate evidence by burning the bodies with kerosene. The victim was living with her in-laws. On August 15, 2003, when there was no one in the house, Kumar attempted to assault his sister-in-law. When she resisted, he hit her with a wooden object. Once she collapsed, he raped her. Later, he punched the baby on its face. As both of them fell unconscious, he borrowed kerosene from a neighbour and burnt them. Before setting them ablaze, he tried to create an alibi by threatening a neighbour, who became a prosecution witness later, into calling the victim's brother. Relying heavily on circumstantial evidence, the I Additional Sessions Judge, Salem, awarded life imprisonment to Kumar on March 31, 2004. The appeal was directed against the trial court order. Dismissing the appeal, the bench said, "the prosecution has satisfactorily discharged their onus of proving the link between the chain of circumstances to bring home the guilt of the accused." In a separate judgment, justice Regupathi observed: "Wails and attempts of a young helpless woman, pleading for mercy and for sparing her honour and life, did not deter the vulture-like culprit, who is none else than her brother-in-law, from committing the most ghastly crime of rape and murder." Rejecting the defence, the judge said hyper-technicalities or figment of imagination should not be allowed to divest the court of its responsibility of sifting and weighing the evidence to arrive at a just conclusion. He also observed that while a murderer destroys the physical body of the victim, a rapist degrades the soul of the helpless female. subramani.a@timesgroup.com
25 Apr 2008, 0411 hrs IST , A Subramani , TNN
THE TIMES OF INDIA