SC concern over increasing cases of sexual assault of minor

 The Supreme Court has expressed serious concern over the increasing number of cases of sexual assault, involving rape and murder of minor girls. Two judges of the apex court, however, differed on the quantum of sentence while upholding the conviction of a person in a rape and murder of a 10-year-old girl, who was a student of class four, in Surat district of Gujarat in 1999. Presiding judge Justice Arijit Pasayat, upheld the death sentence awarded to Ramesh Bhai Chandi Bhai Rathod, a chowkidar, however, the other judge on the bench, Justice Asok Kumar Ganguly said that the case did not fall in the rarest of rare category and therefore commuted the death sentence to life imprisonment. The two judges finally referred the matter to a larger bench on the point of quantum of the sentence. The bench directed the registry to place the matter before Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan for marking to a larger bench. Justice Pasyat, in his 33-page separate judgment noted, ‘The plea that in a case of circumstantial evidence that should not be avoided is without any logic. If the circumstantial evidence is found to be of unimpeachable character in establishing the guilt of the accused, that forms the foundation of the conviction. It has nothing to do with the question of sentence as has been observed by this court in various cases while awarding death sentence. The mitigating circumstances and the aggravating circumstances have to balanced.’ ‘In fact in most of the cases where death sentence is awarded for rape and murder and the like there is practically no scope for having an eyewitness as they are not committed in the public view,’ he said. ‘The case at hand falls in the rarest of rare category as the circumstances highlighted establish the act of the accused and it calls for only one sentence that is death sentence,’ he said. Justice Ganguly, however, in his separate 56-page judgment while agreeing with Justice Pasayat said that the appellant was guilty of rape and murder of the minor girl, differed on the point of sentence and noted that instead of death sentence, a sentence of rigorous imprisonment will serve the ends of justice. The convict was awarded death sentence by a fast track court in Surat and it was confirmed by the Gujarat High Court.