POCSO court upholds death sentence of man who raped, murdered his mentally unsound daughter

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A POCSO court on Wednesday affirmed the death sentence of a man for raping and murdering his 15-year-old mentally unsound daughter here five years ago.
The court also slapped a penalty of Rs 10,000 on the convict.

The special court under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, had on January 20 termed the crime as "most heinous" and "shameful for human society" and awarded death penalty to the 45-year-old man while imposing a fine of Rs 20,000 on him.

Judge Ashok Choudhary had held the 45-year-old guilty of repeatedly raping his 15-year-old daughter and killing her so that the crime of rape and pregnancy could not be revealed.

The court had sentenced the father to life term under sections related to rape and awarded death penalty for the murder.

However, the convict approached the high court against the judgment which directed the POCSO court to cross examine the victim's mother.

The cross examination was done and the statements of the mother remained the same while the three witnesses produced in the defence could not state significantly, public prosecutor, POCSO court-1, Premnarayan Namdev said.

POCSO court judge Ashok Choudhary upheld his previous decision and affirmed the death sentence and also imposed a penalty of Rs 10,000, he said.

"If the crime is committed by the accused father as a result to satisfy his lust, it is apt to shake internal social bondage of a particular man, family and society," the judge observed.

The 15-year-old girl was found murdered on May 13, 2015 inside her house in Nayapura Police Station area of Kota city. After the post-mortem report revealed the pregnancy, the police collected DNA samples which confirmed that the accused had fathered the foetus.

The statement of deceased minor's mother corroborated police's theory as she said her husband had been raping their daughter for long which resulted in her pregnancy.

The police then arrested the father and filed a charge sheet against him.

The convict is a father of six children including the victim and worked as a guard at a warehouse in the city.

He had himself lodged a report at Nayapura police station on the day she was killed, alleging that when he returned home in the evening he found his daughter dead, the public prosecutor said.

The victim's mother ran a tea stall outside the warehouse with the help of the couple''s minor son.

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