The death sentence of a condemned prisoner belonging to Assam has been commuted to life imprisonment by President Pranab Mukherjee. The President has commuted the death sentence of Man Bahadur Dewan, alias Tote Dewan, who hails from Assam's Dibrugarh district, to life imprisonment, official sources said on Thursday.
This is one of the rare cases where Mukherjee has commuted the death sentence after becoming President in 2012. The relief to the condemned prisoner came after the President rejected mercy petitions of 22 death row convicts at a stretch. Dewan was sentenced to death for killing his wife and two minor sons, in September 2002.
The prisoner had also killed one of his neighbours, Bidhimaya, and surrendered before the police after the multiple murder. In Dewan's case, Mukherjee is believed to have relied upon the opinion of the Home Ministry which had advised him to take a lenient view of the case.