Kolkata, Jan 24 (IANS) A division bench of the Calcutta High Court will hear the plea by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) seeking the death penalty for Sanjay Roy, the sole convict in the R.G. Kar rape and murder case, on January 27.
The CBI had earlier this week challenged the order of a special court in Kolkata on January 20 sentencing Roy to “life imprisonment”. The agency approached the division bench of Justice Debangshu Basak and Justice Shabbar Rashidi seeking the death penalty for the convict.
As per the list of cases scheduled for hearing on Monday at Calcutta High Court, the matter will come up for hearing at the said division bench on that day.
Incidentally, a parallel appeal by the West Bengal government with a similar plea for the death penalty for Roy is also scheduled for hearing on the same day at the same division bench. However, the hearing on the state government’s plea will decide the merit of admissibility of the petition.
The CBI had already challenged the petition by the state government and questioned the grounds on which the state government could make such an appeal.
According to the counsel for the central agency, CBI being the investigating agency in the case and the victim’s parents could only move such a plea at a higher court, and not the state government which is not a party in the case.
To recall, after the body of the victim was recovered from a seminar hall within the R.G. Kar premises on the morning of August 9 last year, the initial investigation was carried out by the Kolkata Police, whose sleuths also arrested Roy. However, after five days of initial investigation by the city police, the charge of the probe was handed over to the CBI by the Calcutta High Court.
–IANS
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