The trial court delivered ruling just about a year after the crime was committed (Representational)
A 26-year-old man was on Monday awarded a death sentence for raping an eight-year-old child and strangling her before dumping her body in a drain in Rajasthan's Sirohi last September.
Special Judge Ajitabh Acharya of the POCSO court gave capital punishment to convict Nikram alias Bharma, terming his heinous offence as "the rarest of rare".
The court had held the accused guilty of rape and murder on September 24 and had slated Monday for announcing the quantum of sentence.
After hearing arguments on the quantum of the sentence from the prosecution and defence counsel, the judge ruled that it was a rarest of rare case deserving nothing less than a death term.
"Children have all the right to live in society happily without any fear and insecurity. But newspapers today are replete with the news of rapes of young girls. If children are not safe outside the home, this is a matter of huge concern," the judge said, underlining the gravity of the offence.
"The legislature had amended the POCSO Act in 2019 because of the spurt in such crimes against children. Hence in the present case, the accused is a curse for the society and it is justified to give the death sentence to him," Special Public Prosecutor Prakash Dhawal said quoting from the judgement of the court.
The trial court delivered its ruling just about a year after the crime was committed on September 25 last year when Nikaram had got hold of the girl when she had ventured out of her home to play with her brother and friends.
Nikaram detained the child after scaring away other children and then raped her, Sirohi senior police official Dharmendra Singh said, adding he subsequently strangled the girl and dumped her body in a drain.
After registering the FIR, the case was taken up for investigation under the Officer's Scheme which envisages an expeditious probe into an offence under close supervision of a senior officer.
The case was investigated by Sirohi Circle Officer Nagendra Singh, who said after committing the gruesome act, Nikaram had fled to a nearby jungle and kept himself hidden there for a week during which he survived by eating things like leaves and grass.
He was eventually arrested and put on trial.
The police did a painstaking probe into the case which was largely based on circumstantial evidence but the police went in for the DNA profiling of the accused and the victim and managed to line up a total of 24 prosecution witnesses in the court none of whom turned hostile, he said.