Ex-Army personnel held guilty of killing son

A retired Army man has been held guilty of killing his son by a Delhi court for asking him not to fight with his mother and and wife.

Additional Sessions Judge Rajneesh Kumar Gupta convicted Shish Ram for killing his son, holding that the deceased was only pursuing his father not to quarrel, but the convict shot him with his gun in a "cruel and unusual manner."

"From the evidence of prosecution witnesses (the accused wife and minor grand son), it is proved that the deceased was only pursuing the accused (Ram) not to quarrel and that there was no threat to him from the deceased.

"On the other hand, Ram shot the deceased with his gun in a close range in his chest, acting in a cruel and unusual manner," the court said.

Ram was arrested on April 6, 2009 on victim Purshotam's wife's complaint with Nihal Vihar police station, alleging that her husband was shot dead by her father-in-law.

The complainant had told the police that after her marriage, they along with her in-laws were living together as a joint family in West Delhi.

She said on the fateful day, a drunken Ram had picked up fight with his wife for not cooking properly and proceeded on to use filthy language against her, when her husband objected to him and asked him to keep quite.

Ram, however, became more violent and went into his room, brought his gun and fired upon her husband, she told police and later to the court.