Gondia: In connection with the brutal murder of a physically-challenged divyang woman who was pregnant of 32 weeks, all the three accused including her husband were held guilty by the Principal District and Sessions Judge A T Wankhede and sentenced them to life imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 each on them. The ruling was delivered on Saturday evening.
According to the prosecution, the deceased who was the resident of a village in Umrer fell in love with accused Mohammad Samir Mohammad Aslam Sheikh (26), resident of Lakhani in Bhandara. He was a labourer and also had a criminal record. He was temporarily living in Butibori, during which period he went to Umrer for work where he came in contact with the deceased girl Sakhu alias Shital Shamrao Raut (30) whom he trapped in an affair and once she got pregnant, accused started avoiding her. Once he had left her and the deceased had also lodged a complaint with Butibori Police.
Meanwhile, she also came to know that Mohhamad Samir was engaged to some other Muslim girl, following which they often had quarrels. To get rid of the growing issues with the deceased, Mohhamad Samir conspired with Asif Sherkhan Pathan (35), resident of Bhandara, and Praful Pandurang Shivankar (25), resident of Umrer. He took the deceased on motorcycle to the forest of Dhaasgarh within the jurisdiction of Chichgarh Police Station in Gondia district on June 22, 2021, where the other accused were already waiting. The trio brutally killed the woman with sharp edged weapons and threw her body in the forest area.
On getting the information Chichgarh Police Station had registered an offence under the relevant Sections of 302, 201 (B), 34 of IPC, looking at the serious nature, police had formed three different teams and arrested all three accused some three weeks later. The trial of the case went for around one year, during the trial Assistant Director and Public Prosecutor Adv Satish Ghode questioned as many as 20 witnesses and proved 187 documents.
Adv Ghode said that there were no evidential proofs but the Last Call Theory (LCT) worked in their favour. “All three accused were having frequent communication on the day of the incident and their location was found in the same place. Soon after they committed the crime, they stopped communication with each other and this circumstantial evidence worked against them in proving the crime,” Ghode added.
He also informed that both Mohhamad Samir and Asif Pathan were having previous criminal records against them. Going through the witnesses and circumstantial evidences Principal and District Sessions Judge Wankhede held all three accused guilty of the crime of killing the divyang and pregnant woman in a brutal manner. He sentenced all three accused to life imprisonment and also slapped a fine of Rs 10,000 each in case of default to which they will have to undergo additional six months jail term.
Adv Ghode was assisted by Investigating Officer API Manohar Iskape and the then SDPO Jalinder Naalkul under the guidance of SP Nikhil Pingale and Additional SP Nityanand Jha.
