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New Delhi: On Saturday, All four convicts in the murder of journalist Soumya Vishwanathan to life imprisonment sentenced by Delhi court, almost 15 years after the crime took place in the national capital. The court said the crime does not fall under the rarest of rare and hence did not give the convicts the death penalty.
All four accused, Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, Balbir Malik, Ajay Kumar, have also been fined Rs 25,000 and Rs 1 lakh each under the Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA). A fine of Rs 5 lakh has been imposed on the fifth accused Ajay Sethi. The fifth convict, Ajay Sethi, has been sentenced to simple for three years for helping them.
The court observed that the act of the four convicts does not fall under the ‘rarest of rare’ category and hence, the death penalty cannot be imposed. September 30, 2008, was just another day for 25-year-old journalist Soumya Vishwanathan. A news producer with Headlines Today, she had stayed back late to help out with a breaking news event.
Her work was done, she left the Jhandewalan office at 3.03 am, got into her car, and drove home to Vasant Kunj. She didn’t know this drive would be her last, that a late-night robbery attempt would brutally cut her life short. The court, on October 18, convicted all five accused of murder and common intention. The convicts were also held guilty under the provisions of the MCOCA for committing organised crime resulting in the death of the person. The offences entail the death penalty as the maximum sentence.
On her way back, Soumya overtook a car occupied by Kapoor, Shukla, Kumar, and Malik, police officers who probed the case said. Ajay Sethi was also convicted under Section 411 (dishonestly receiving stolen property) and MCOCA provisions for conspiring to abet, aid or knowingly facilitate organised crime and for receiving the proceeds of organised crime.
According to the prosecution, Kapoor shot Vishwanathan with a country-made pistol on Nelson Mandela Marg while chasing the victim’s car to rob her. Shukla, Kumar and Malik were also with Kapoor. Initially believed to be a car accident until forensic reports disclosed her cause of death as a gunshot wound to the head. The killers fled the scene, an officer said but returned 20 minutes later to check the victim’s condition. When they saw police personnel, they ran away.
