The Bombay High Court on Thursday commuted the death sentence awarded to three convicts in the 2013 Shakti Mills gangrape case to life imprisonment.
Vijay Jadhav, Mohammad Qasim Bengali and Mohammad Ansari had been convicted by a sessions court on the ground of gangraping a 23-year-old photojournalist in the Shakti Mills area of Mumbai. A Division Bench of Justices Sadhana Jadhav and Prithviraj Chavan refused to confirm the death penalty awarded to the three accused, and commuted their sentence to life imprisonment for the remainder of their lives.
The court said: “They deserve imprisonment for life to repent the offence committed by them.”
The court said that death puts an end to the concept of repentance and it cannot be said that the accused deserved only the death penalty. The court further said:
“The convicts shall not be entitled for parole or furlough as they cannot be allowed to assimilate in the society and as there is no scope for reformation.”
The judges ruled that the court follows the procedure and cannot award punishment based on public opinion and though it may be contrary to the majority view. On March 20, 2014, the sessions judge first held the three accused guilty for the gangrape of a telephone operator and minutes later pronounced them guilty for the gangrape of the photojournalist. They were awarded capital punishment as per Section 376 (e) of the IPC which provides for the punishment of repeat rape offenders with death.
In April 2014, the trio had approached the high court challenging the validity of IPC Section 376 (e) and contended that the sessions court acted beyond its power in awarding them the death penalty. The three were awarded the death penalty under the amended section 376 (e) of IPC which says maximum sentence of life or death can be awarded to repeat offenders.