President's medal awardee policeman gets life imprisonment for killing woman cop
A court in Maharashtra on Monday sentenced former police inspector Abhay Kurundkar, a President's medal recipient, to life imprisonment for the 2016 killing of assistant police inspector Ashwini Bidre-Gore, 37, with whom he was having an affair.Judge KR Paldewar of the Panvel sessions court said for handing a death sentence, there was a parameter under which it was to be seen if this was a case of exception.advertisement"The way the body was dismembered and disposed of shows brutality, but it does not make it an exceptional case. The age of the accused has to be considered and the reformation probability. He is a family man. He lost his wife in the pandemic. He has an unmarried son, so there is a chance of reform," he said.
"I do not think this is a case of an exception being made out. So, this is a case of life sentence," the judge added.Special Public Prosecutor Pradeep Gharat, representing the Maharashtra government, had sought the death penalty for Kurundkar, who was convicted earlier this month by the Panvel sessions court.Pointing out the seriousness of the crime, Gharat submitted, "When a police officer commits the murder of a lower-rank officer, that too a woman, and the body is cut into pieces and disposed of to destroy evidence, it shakes the collective conscience of society".advertisementAshwini was married in 2005 to Raju Gore, an engineer, social activist and a farmer, and they had a daughter. But, the relationship between the two was strained and Ashwini was living on her own in Navi Mumbai.According to prosecution, Kurundkar was also married and he and Ashwini were involved in a relationship. The prosecution claimed that it was Ashwini's insistence on getting married to Kurundkar that led him to murder her at his residence in Thane in 2016.Ashwini, an API with the Navi Mumbai police's human rights cell, went missing on April 11, 2016.According to the prosecution, Kurundkar had shown the utmost cruelty while killing and disposing of Ashwini's body. After he had strangled her, he had cut her body into small parts, stuffed it in a trunk and sack and dumped it in Vasai creek. The remains were never found and the entire case was built on circumstantial evidence by the prosecution.Kurundkar was awarded the President's medal in 2017, the year he was arrested in the case. As per the police, Kurundkar was in an extra-marital relationship with Gore.Kurundkar's driver, Kundan Bhandari, and his friend Mahesh Phalanikar, who have been in jail since 2018, were also convicted for destruction of evidence. However, since they had already spent more than the maximum punishment in jail, they were let off after the pronouncement of judgment. The judge said that their release order will be handed to them on Monday.advertisementWhile Ashwini was killed in 2016, it was only after 2017 that the investigation picked up pace. Ashwini's family recounted how the police did nothing on their complaint and even recommended Kurundkar for the President's medal for gallantry in 2017.Gharat submitted a list of police officers to the court, saying that their acts of omission and commission furthered and facilitated the burking of the incident. He said action under Section 109 (punishment for abetment) of the Indian Penal Code should be initiated against them.The judge has recommended action against all those policemen who had allegedly derelicted duty.(with inputs from PTI)
IN THIS STORY#Maharashtra#Mumbai
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