A city sessions court on Monday convicted a security guard Sajjad Ahmed Mughal, alias Pathan, for brutally murdering a 25-year-old law graduate Pallavi Purkayastha, daughter of a senior New Delhi-based IAS officer, after she resisted his attempt to rape her in her 16th floor flat at Wadala here in August 2012.
After a comprehensive trial that saw the Prosecution examine 40 witnesses and defence lawyer record statements of three witnesses, Sessions Judge Vrushali Joshi held 26-year-old security guard Mughal guilty of murder, molestation and criminal trespass.
Delivering the verdict in a packed court room, the judge addressed accused Mughal — standing in the dock — and noted: “A case of murder, molestation and criminal trespass has been proved against you”. In response, Mughal nodded silently.
The court will hear final arguments from both the prosecution and defence lawyers and pronounce quantum of sentence on Mughal, on July 3.
Pallavi’s parents — Atanu Purkayastha, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture and Sumita, Director General in the National Institute of Communication Finance, Department of Telecommunication — who were present in the court room when the verdict was delivered — said that Mughal deserved death sentence for the heinous crime committed by him. “Death and nothing less than death (should be given),” Atanu said.
Pallavi was found dead with her throat slit and multiple stab wounds all over her body, in her 16th floor flat of ‘Himalayan Heights’ building at Wadala in north-central Mumbai, in the small hours of August 9, 2012.
Apart from slitting Pallavi’s throat, Mughal had stabbed her in face, chest, cheeks and both the hands, with knife that he carried with him when he stealthily entered into her flat using a key that he had stolen from the flat when he visited the flat along with an electrician to restore power in an hour earlier.
At the time of incident, Pallavi was alone at the flat which she was sharing with her boyfriend and would-be life partner Avik Sengupta (26). Mughal was arrested by the police at the Mumbai Central Railway station on the very night of the incident, when he was trying to flee to his home district of Baramula in Jammu & Kashmir, after committing Pallavi’s murder
In its 434-page charge-sheet filed in the sessions court on October 30, 2012, the Prosecuti-on had charged Mughal with criminal trespass and murder.
Among other things, the Prosecution stated in the charge-sheet that stated that Mughal had — in his confessional statement to the police — admitted that he stabbed Pallavi to death after she resisted his attempts to force himself on her when she was alone in her flat at around 1.30 am on August 9.
The Prosecution had told the trial court that the police had recovered the knife used in the crime, blood-stained uniform of Mughal and other incriminating evidence like hairs and skin scrapes of the accused security guard recovered from Pallavi’s nails.
In its charge-sheet, the Prosecution had stated that the DNA analysis of the evidence material recovered from the crime scene like the hairs and skin scrapes matched with that of the accused.
Pallavi was working as a manager, legal affairs with filmmaker Faran Aktar’s Excel Entertainment Private limited, while her boyfriend Avik — also a law graduate — was an associate with corporate law firm, Sagar Associates.
The two had known each other since law college days in Pune and were planning to get married soon. Avik was away at work when Pallavi was murdered. Avik, who returned home from work in the early hours of August 9, found Pallavi in a pool of blood in her night clothes.
Avik, who went into depression after Pallavi’s shocking murder and never recovered from his prolonged mental illness, died on November 14,2014. Talking to media persons outside the court after the conviction in the case, Pallavi's parents demanded death for Mughal.
Alluding to the murder of his daughter Pallavi and subsequent death of his would-be son-in-law Avik, father Atanu said: “Two families have been devastated. Death and nothing less than death (should be given). A positive message will go in the society if death is given”.
Echoing her husband's views, Pallavi's mother Sumita said: “For two years, my family as well as Avik's family have gone through a lot of trauma. I have lost my daughter and would be son-in law. He (Mughal) should get maximum punishment under law for his crime”.