Capital punishment to Nagai man for minors rape

CHENNAI: The death sentence awarded by a trial court in Nagapattinam last year to a 34-year-old youth for raping a 12-year-old girl and murdering her 10-year-old brother has been confirmed by the Madras High Court.The extreme depravity with which the offence of rape was committed on the school-going child and the merciless manner in which her brother was murdered brought this case within the category of the rarest of rare cases which merited death penalty, a division bench comprising Justices C Nagappan and M Sathya­narayanan has observed. B Kumar worked as a mason at the house of one Ramalingam. After disengagement of his service, he entered Ramalingam’s house on October 4, 2002, when the girl, her brother, Manikandan, and a relative, Sangeetha (12), were alone in the house. Kumar gagged Manikandan and Sangeetha and raped his sister. When Manikandan noticed this, Kumar attacked him with a sickle, killing him on the spot. He also attacked Sangeetha and robbed some jewellery from the house before fleeing.After six years, the CB-CID in Pudukkottai arrested Kumar and registered cases on the charges of rape, murder and robbery. The sessions judge in Nagapattinam on December 8, 2010 awarded life imprisonment for rape and death sentence for the murder. Hence, the present appeal from Kumar. His counsel contended that it was not a rarest of rare cases attracting death sentence.Rejecting the contention, the bench observed that the accused did not feel any remorse in regard to his actions and he was a menace to society and was incapable of rehabilitation. The victims were innocent children and the action of the accused had, no doubt, shocked the collective conscience of society and such a cruelty towards young children was appalling. Hence, the punishment of death sentence had to be confirmed, the bench said, and accordingly, it confirmed the sentence and dismissed Kumar’s appeal.