A three judge bench of the Supreme Court has converted the death sentence of a man convicted for the rape and murder of a 10-year-old in Surat to 'full life' sentence.
Ramesh Chandubhai Rathod, a watchman of the Sanudip Apartment in Rander area of Surat was convicted for the rape and murder of a 10 year old in 1999. The child was resident of the apartment were Rathod worked as a watchman. Rathod killed the child by throttling her neck and even inflicted knife injuries on her.
Rathod,28, was then sentenced to death by a Surat Court and the verdict was upheld by the Gujarat high court. Rathod then appealed before the SC against the high court judgement. But a two judge bench of the SC come out with split verdict. In the verdict justice Arijit Pasayat upheld the high court's order granting death sentence as the case fell in the rarest of rare categories.
On the other hand justice AK Ganguli said Rathod should be given life sentence as there was some uncertainty about the nature of the circumstantial evidence and that the mitigating circumstance particularly the young age of the accused and the possibility that he could be rehabilitated should be taken into consideration.
The case then came to the three judge bench of the court which on January 24, 2011, ruled that the accused is liable to full life sentence rather then death sentence. The three judge bench of Justice Harjit Singh Bedi, Justice P Sathasivam and Justice Chandramauli KR Prasad observed that there is a very thin line of facts which separates capital sentence from a life sentence in this case.
The judges further said that in light of the findings recorded by Justice Ganguli, it would not be proper to maintain the death sentence but the gravity of the offense also cannot be ignored. The bench the accordingly commuted the death sentence to life sentence that must extend to the full life of the accused but subject to any remission at the instance of the government for good and sufficient reasons.
