Kolkata, Jan 17 (IANS) A court in West Bengal on Friday handed the death penalty to an individual, Ashoke Sinha, convicted for raping and murdering a five-year old minor girl at Gurap in Hooghly district in November last year.
The death sentence was pronounced by judge Chandraprabha Bhattacharya of the POCSO court at Chinsurah in Hooghly district on Friday, exactly 55 days after the crime took place.
January 17 was also the birthday of the minor victim, as told by her mother to the mediapersons after the sentence was pronounced.
“My daughter asked me to gift her with a cake this birthday. But that was not possible. I left the entire matter entirely to the police investigation. Finally, my daughter has got the justice and I am happy over the court order,” the victim’s mother said.
In the Gurap case, the minor girl went missing from her residence in the evening of November 24 last year.
After a lot of searching, her body was ultimately recovered from the residence of the convict, who was the neighbor of the victim’s family.
The local residents had severely thrashed him and then handed him over to the police.
The verdict on Friday, made the local villagers so elated that they were seen greeting the investigating officers and the public prosecutor outside the court.
The state of West Bengal as well as the entire nation was shocked by the ghastly incident of rape and murder of junior woman doctor on the premises of the R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata last year.
The crucial verdict is expected to be delivered by a special Kolkata court on Saturday.
Civic volunteer Sanjay Roy is the “sole prime accused” in the rape and murder crime.
Roy was initially arrested by the Kolkata Police just a day after the body of the victim doctor was recovered from a seminar hall of R.G. Kar premises in the morning of August 2024.
Although the CBI arrested the former and controversial principal of R.G. Kar Sandip Ghosh and the former SHO of Tala Police Station Abhijit Mondal on charges of tampering and altering the evidence, both were granted “default bail” later by the same special court since the CBI failed to file supplementary charge sheet against them within 90 days from the date of their arrest.
The process of framing charges against Roy at the special court was completed on November 4, 2024, and, henceforth, the trial process started on November 11.
–IANS
src/pgh
