District Judge Bijay Ketan Mohanty on Tuesday sentenced two persons to life and another to seven years of rigorous imprisonment (RI) for killing one Smruti Ranjan Manik over a dispute in September, 2009.
The convicted persons have been identified as Ramesh Agrawalla of Wall Tax Road in Chennai, Sanjay Kumar Das of Belarpur and Siba Charan Kar of Gopa village. While Das is the
manager of the Keshapur Bazaar Aram lodge, Kar is its owner.
According to sources, Smrutiranjan Manika (35), a resident of Balipatana village under Tirtol police station, was the owner of an Atharabanki-based hotel at Paradip.
On September 6, 2008, he had come to Aram lodge to spend a night with a prostitute. He had met Agrawalla, the middleman, who had provided a girl.
The next day, Manika again asked Agrawalla to provide the same girl once again by offering him Rs1,500.
On being denied, Manika had forcibly tried to keep the girl with him against her wish in room -13 of the lodge.
Infuriated over the development, Agrawalla and Das allegedly killed Manika on September 7 night by strangulating him with the help of the girl.
After the murder, Agrawalla and the girl had fled from the lodge. Deceased Manika’s elder brother on September 8 had lodged an FIR at the Kendrapada police station over the murder of his brother. The police later had seized the body and arrested the trio.