The Bombay high court has upheld the conviction and life sentence awarded to two brothers for killing their neighbour over a trivial issue of allegedly staring at them.
The division bench of acting Chief Justice V.K. Tahilramani and A.S. Gadkari observed that the trial court rightly convicted Santosh Rajput (35) and Jitu Rajput (20) and the life sentence awarded to them was also just and fair. The bench held that there were eyewitnesses to the incident and their statement is not shaken by the cross-examination.
The sessions court in the Thane district had convicted both the brothers in July 2007 for killing their neighbour Mahesh Deshmukh as he used to look at them angrily.
The prosecution case is that Jitu told his brother and family that deceased Mahesh used to always look at him angrily. Almost 15 days before the incident, Jitu and Santosh’s mother called deceased’s wife Sharmila, elder brother and sister to their flat in Gayatri Apartment and asked her to warn her husband to stop staring at Jitu or else face dire consequences.
On this, Sharmila explained to the convicts’ family that her husband naturally had an angry look in his eyes and did not have any grudge against anybody. She requested them to let go of the matter.
Despite this, on December 13, 2004 Sharmila, her nephew Hemant and two others saw Jitu and Santosh stabbing Mahesh with knives near the building entrance. When Hemant tried to stop them, the duo stabbed him too. Both the injured were rushed to the hospital, but the doctors declared Maesh dead on arrival.
The high court in its order observed that four persons had witnessed the incident and evidence was sufficient to sustain the conviction and sentence of both the accused. The bench also held that the prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt that the accused had assaulted Mahesh due to which he died.
