A POCSO b(Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act) Court on Thursday awarded death sentence to a man for raping and murdering a 6-year-old girl about a year and a half agoterming it “not a rare but rarest of rare case.”
The sentence comes against the backdrop of the ongoing controversy over the RG Kar College rape and murder case.
Special POCSO Judge Sudipto Bhattacharya sentenced Ashok Kumar Shaw the accused to death terming he deserved no mercy for the crime he had committed against a child who had no chance of defending herself.
“Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent,” the judge said while announcing the quantum of punishment. The victim was raped and murdered in the Tiljala area of south-east Kolkata, on March 26, 2023. She was allegedly lured away by the convict.
The police subsequently discovered her body in a nearby flat. Wednesday’s was the third such verdict in a matter of a few months in the State.
“The prosecution was able to establish the case successfully and the guilty was finally brought to book … and an exemplary punishment was awarded,” said Madhavi Ghosh the Public Prosecutor.
