The Supreme Court on Tuesday adjourned the hearing on an appeal filed by a man, challenging a Gujarat High Court order upholding the death sentence awarded to him for sodomising and killing a 4-year-old boy in 2016.
The case of convict Sambhubhai Raisangbhai Padhiyar had come up before a bench comprising Justices N V Ramana, Sanjiv Khanna, Krishna Murari, which adjourned the matter.
Padhiyar has moved the apex court against the high court order, which upheld the sessions court verdict awarding him capital punishment in the case under provisions of the Indian Penal Code and Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012.
A special and additional sessions judge had on April 26, 2018 found the man guilty of the offences punishable under sections 302 , 364 and 377 of IPC and sections 4 and 6 of POCSO and sentenced him to death.
In 2016, Padhiyar kidnapped the child by luring him with an ice cream in an area in Ahmedabad and later sexually assaulted the boy. After the act, the convict brutally strangulated the boy to death and threw the corpse in bushes.
According to section 302 of IPC, whoever commits murder shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine.
Section 364 IPC says whoever kidnaps or abducts any person in order that such person may be murdered or may be so disposed of as to be put in danger of being murdered, shall be punished with imprisonment for life or rigorous imprisonment for a term which may extend to ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.
Section 377 IPC provides for punishment for voluntary carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal up to imprisonment for life, or with a jail term of either description which may extend to ten years, and a fine.