Hello Mumbai City Desk :

In a fresh development, the Bombay High Court on Thursday commuted the death sentence to Vijay Jadhav, Mohammad Qasim Shaikh Bengali and Mohammed Salim Ansari for gang-rape of a 23-year-old photo journalist at the defunct Shakti Mills Compound in Patel in August 2013. Earlier in 2014, the apex Court awarded the trio life imprisonment while upholding life term for the fourth convict.

This was the first of its kind sentence under the new rape law enacted following the 2012 gang rape and murder of a Delhi student. The amended law provided for the death sentence to repeat rape convicts.

The three were also sentenced to life imprisonment for gang-raping a 19-year-old call centre employee at the same place in July 2013. The fourth convict in the case, Siraj Rehman, was sentenced to life.

A high court division bench of justices Sadhana Jadhav and Prithviraj Chavan was hearing the confirmation reference case and appeal against the sessions court order since October.

Advocates Yug Chaudhry and Payoshi Roy, who represented the convicts, argued the trial court wrongly applied Section 376 E of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which says a repeat rape offender will have to be imprisoned for the rest of life or sentenced to death. They argued the section provides for the death penalty to a repeat offender convicted for offences punishable under IPC Sections 376, 376 A and 376 D. They said the trials in both the cases of rape were held simultaneously.

According to the lawyers the trial court passed the conviction order in both cases on the same day. They added punishment was pronounced in the call centre employee rape case and the prosecution was accordingly allowed to charge the convicts under Section 376 E in the second case.

News Input: K.V.Raman