2014 Yug murder case: Himachal HC commutes death penalty of 2 convicts, acquits 1
Three convicts had appealed against the death sentence handed down to them by the Shimla district and sessions judge in 2018 for kidnapping the four-year-old boy in 2014 and torturing him before tying stones to his body and throwing him alive into a water tank.
The Himachal Pradesh high court on Tuesday acquitted a convict and commuted the death sentence of two to life term in the 2014 kidnapping and murder of four-year-old Shimla boy Yug Gupta.
A division bench of justice Vivek Singh Thakur and justice Rakesh Kainthla ruled that convicts, Chander Sharma, 26 and Vikrant Bakshi, 22, would remain in jail “till their last breath”. Tejinder Pal, 29, was acquitted of all charges.
“The material on record does not show that the accused cannot be reformed, hence we are unable to confirm the death penalty imposed by the trial court despite our indignation towards the crime,” ruled the bench.
The case had been referred to the high court by the Shimla sessions judge for confirmation of capital punishment, while the convicts had filed an appeal challenging their conviction.
Expressing disappointment over the verdict, Yug’s father Vinod Gupta said: “Even after 11 years, justice has been denied to us. We will file an appeal in the Supreme Court.”
Yug, who was abducted from his courtyard in busy Ram Bazaar in the heart of the town on June 14, 2014, was tortured and killed after seven days, even before the first call for ransom of ₹3.6 crore was made. His skeletal remains were recovered two years later from a water tank of the Shimla municipal corporation in Kelston on August 21, 2016. The probe revealed chilling details as the three had tied stones to the child and thrown him alive into the tank. The case sparked outrage with candlelight marches and protests, demanding swift justice.
{{/usCountry}}Yug, who was abducted from his courtyard in busy Ram Bazaar in the heart of the town on June 14, 2014, was tortured and killed after seven days, even before the first call for ransom of ₹3.6 crore was made. His skeletal remains were recovered two years later from a water tank of the Shimla municipal corporation in Kelston on August 21, 2016. The probe revealed chilling details as the three had tied stones to the child and thrown him alive into the tank. The case sparked outrage with candlelight marches and protests, demanding swift justice.
{{/usCountry}}4-yr-old kidnapped by neighbour
{{/usCountry}}4-yr-old kidnapped by neighbour
{{/usCountry}}According to the prosecution, Yug was kidnapped by his neighbour Chander, who lured him by offering a chocolate and took him to Tajender Singh’s godown situated just above Yug’s house.
{{/usCountry}}According to the prosecution, Yug was kidnapped by his neighbour Chander, who lured him by offering a chocolate and took him to Tajender Singh’s godown situated just above Yug’s house.
{{/usCountry}}Later, he was whisked away to Chander’s rented house at Ram Chandera Chowk in a sports utility vehicle (SUV) of Tejinder. Yug’s clothes were burned to destroy evidence. The kid was tortured, forced to drink liquor and dumped in a water tank on June 21, 2014, seven days after the abduction, said the prosecution.
The crime investigation department filed the chargesheet on October 25, 2016, and the trial commenced on February 20, 2017. On August 6, 2018, all three accused were pronounced guilty.
Describing the heinous crime as “rarest among rare”, the district and sessions court on September 5, 2018, awarded the death sentence to the convicts under IPC sections 302 (murder) and 364(a) (kidnapping for murder for ransom.
Evidence questioned
Unimpressed by the submission of the deputy attorney general that the convict had brutally killed a young boy, the HC bench on Tuesday held: “The submission is not based on the material on record. The evidence is silent as to what transpired after Yug was found missing. We have proceeded based on the last seen theory and other circumstances because there is no evidence regarding the events, which had happened between the day when Yug was found missing and when bones were found in the tank at Kelston. Therefore, it is very difficult for us to proceed on the assumption that the convict had treated Yug with brutality justifying the imposition of extreme penalty of death”.
“the evidence is silent to show whether Yug was thrown into the tank before or after his death. The diatom test relied upon by the prosecution to establish that Yug was thrown alive into the tank is not satisfactory, as demonstrated above. Therefore, the submissions that the accused had thrown the child alive into the tank is not supported by the evidence on record,” ruled the HC.
State to file appeal
Additional advocate general Jitender Sharma, who represented the state in the high court, said, “We are not happy with the judgment. We have yet to fully examine the uploaded order, but after reviewing it, we will definitely file an appeal in the Supreme Court. The state will challenge both the commutation of the death sentence and the acquittal of Tejinder Pal”.
The three convicts had moved the high court saying that the investigating agency falsely implicated them when they could not solve the sensational crime for more than two years. “Merely because a young child has died is no reason to impose the extreme penalty of death. The case was based on circumstantial evidence, and the death penalty should not have been imposed upon the accused in a case of circumstantial evidence,” submitted the counsels of the accused.
Yug’s father Vinod, a businessman, said their fight will go on. “Had this heinous crime not been committed, Yug would have been 15 years old,” he said. “Yug was kept in Tejinder’s house. In fact, his vehicle was used in kidnapping. Still he has been acquitted. It’s shocking,” he said.