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Time of India
20 hours ago
- Time of India
6-yr-old's kidnapping: HC ‘partially' upholds conviction of 3
Raipur: The Chhattisgarh High Court partially upheld the conviction of three individuals in a 2021 kidnapping case. The court set aside charges related to kidnapping for ransom and criminal conspiracy due to a lack of evidence regarding any ransom demand, wherein one accused was aquitted. A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Bibhu Datta Guru observed that while the prosecution successfully established that the accused deceitfully took the child and wrongfully concealed him, there was no evidence to support the charge of a ransom demand. Khilawan Das Mahant alias Nikhil, Amardas Mahant, and Sanjay Sidar were convicted under Sections 363 (kidnapping) and 368/34 (wrongfully concealing a kidnapped person with common intention) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The trial court sentenced them to seven years of rigorous imprisonment. Pritam Das Mahant, to whom the vehicle used in the crime belonged, was acquitted of all charges. The three convicts filed appeals against the judgment dated July 19, 2024, passed by the 2nd Additional Sessions Judge, Raigarh. According to the prosecution, Ramesh Kumar Agarwal, a resident of Chhapriganj, Kharsia, employed Khilawan Das Mahant alias Nikhil Kumar Mahant as a cook. His services were discontinued on Feb 18, 2021. On Feb 20, 2021, Khilawan went to Agarwal's house on the pretext of retrieving a mobile charger. He then lured Agarwal's six-year-old grandson with chips and took him away on his motorcycle without the family's consent. When the child and Khilawan did not return by 7:30 pm and his phone was found switched off, Agarwal lodged a report at Kharsia police station. An offence under Section 364-A IPC (kidnapping for ransom) was registered. CCTV footage from a shop owned by Gopal Bansal confirmed that Khilawan took the child on a motorcycle. Call Detail Records (CDR) showed that Khilawan's phone was switched off after the incident. Investigators tracked a related mobile number, belonging to Amardas, which was found moving towards Jharsuguda in Odisha. Police coordinated with authorities in Chhattisgarh, Odisha, and Jharkhand. The accused were intercepted near Khunti police station in Jharkhand, where they were transporting the child in a car (CG-13-UE-7055). The child was found hidden between the seats. Police recovered a country-made pistol, plastic rope, a chemical substance, adhesive tape, chips, biscuits, water bottles, and mobile phones from the possession of Khilawan, Amardas, and Sanjay Sidar. Further investigation revealed that the motorcycle used in the kidnapping belonged to Pritam Das Mahant, brother of Amardas. Pritam removed and concealed the number plate at the residence of Manik Das in Banjari. His statement led to the recovery of both the number plate and the motorcycle. The child also testified, stating that Khilawan took him on a motorcycle, bought him chips, and later transported him in a car towards Khunti. He identified Amardas and Sanjay Sidar as the other two individuals in the car. The High Court upheld the conviction of Khilawan under Sections 363 and 368/34 IPC, and that of Amardas and Sanjay under Sections 363/34 and 368/34 IPC. However, the court ruled that the essential ingredients of Section 364-A IPC (kidnapping for ransom) were not met. It found that the prosecution failed to prove charges under Section 364-A/34 IPC against all accused. Therefore, the conviction and sentences under these sections were set aside, and the accused were acquitted of the said offences.
New Indian Express
a day ago
- Politics
- New Indian Express
BJP seeks CBI probe into Chinnaswamy stadium stampede
BENGALURU: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R Ashoka demanded that Chief Minister Siddarmaiah order a CBI probe into the stampede during RCB's IPL victory celebrations. In a letter to the CM, Ashoka said that the State Government and the police are making allegations against each other, and people do not know who is responsible for the death of 11 people. The BJP leader said the stampede was a black mark on Karnataka's sports history. The government has washed its hands of by suspending police officers, he said, and added that the Central Administrative Tribunal, during a hearing of a petition filed by a suspended police officer, opined that it is not correct to only blame the police officers. Without politicising the case, it should be handed over to the CBI for a probe to do justice to innocent people who died, he said. The BJP leader said they will continue to fight till the families of the 11 victims get justice. After the stampede during the RCB's victory celebrations, the State Government suspended senior police officers, including the Bengaluru City Police Commissioner, and a judicial probe was ordered. Ex-cop blames smuggling mafia for stampede Former DySP Anupama Shenoy has alleged a conspiracy by anti-social elements behind the stampede. Speaking to reporters here on Saturday, Shenoy said smuggling mafia in Bengaluru was responsible for the chaos. She alleged that they did not want former Police Commissioner B Dayananda to become the next DGP-IGP and created confusion by using mobsters from KG Halli and DJ Halli. In a letter to Bengaluru Urban Deputy Commissioner G Jagadeesha, who is conducting the magisterial inquiry into the incident, Shenoy demanded the retrieval of Call Detail Records (CDR) and verification of CCTV footage to investigate the involvement of the accused in the KG Halli and DJ Halli violence case in the stampede. Shenoy criticised the government for submitting a status report on the incident to the High Court and called for the withdrawal of the same.
Indian Express
3 days ago
- Indian Express
‘Marriage doesn't grant automatic access to private information' – Chhattisgarh HC dismisses man's petition seeking wife's call records
The Chhattisgarh High Court has dismissed a petition filed by a man who sought directions to access his wife's call records, calling it 'violation of privacy'. In his petition before the court, the petitioner claimed that a fortnight after the two married in 2022, his wife's behaviour 'changed drastically' after a visit to her parents' home and that she had 'misbehaved' with his mother and brother. The man claims that he went to fetch her back in September and October that year but she refused, following which he approached a lower court for restitution of conjugal rights (including the right to live together, companionship, and sexual relations) under section 9 of the Hindu Marriage Act. A week later, the woman filed a police complaint, and subsequently an application in court, accusing the man's parents and brother of domestic violence, In January 2024, the man approached the police seeking his estranged wife's Call Data Record (CDR) and also filed a similar application in the family court saying he suspected her of having an 'illicit relationship' with her sister's husband and 'call detail records are necessary to substantiate allegations of adultery'. When the family court dismissed the petition, he approached the high court, which said there was no allegation of adultery in the divorce petition and that accessing her call records would be a violation of the respondent's right to privacy. 'Now coming to the facts of the present case, it is evident that there is no allegation of adultery in the petition filed by the petitioner for the dissolution of marriage. Such allegations have been made for the first time in the written arguments. Moreover, in the application moved by the petitioner seeking call detail records, no allegations were made with regard to adultery,' the court said in its recent order. Marriage did not grant the husband 'automatic access to the wife's private information, communications and personal belongings'. 'The husband cannot compel the wife to share her passwords of the cell phone or bank account and such an act would amount to a violation of privacy and potentially domestic violence. There should be a balance between marital privacy and the need for transparency and at the same time trust in the relationship,' the court said. The right to privacy, the Bench said, 'encompasses the preservation of personal intimacies, the sanctity of family life, marriage, procreation, the home, and sexual orientation. Any intrusion into this right would amount to a violation of the fundamental rights of the individual'.
Indian Express
6 days ago
- Indian Express
IIM-C's academic council to take call on student arrested for rape
The Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta (IIM-C) has called a meeting of its academic council this week over the arrest of a second-year student in a rape case. Paramanand Mahaveer Toppannawar, 26, was arrested last Saturday for allegedly raping a young woman in a hostel room on the Joka campus of the institute. He is in police custody till July 19. According to an official of the premier institute, the academic council will take a call on whether to allow Toppannawar to attend classes if the court grants him bail. 'Attendance is mandatory in the two-year MBA programme. Since Toppannawar is in police custody, he has missed some classes. So, the academic council of the institute has to take a legal opinion regarding whether to allow him to attend classes if he gets bail. If he is found guilty, his degree will be cancelled,' said an official. Following the arrest of the student in the rape case, the IIM-C, in a statement, had said: 'The institute has zero tolerance for such incidents and remains steadfast in upholding a safe and respectful campus environment. We are also taking all necessary steps to support the process of ongoing investigation and ensure that institutional protocols are adhered to.' The IIM-C had also sent an email to students, asking them to reach out to the institute's Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) and student council with any concerns or questions. A standard operating protocol (SOP) was also circulated for the students and professors living on the campus. Meanwhile, the SIT of Kolkata Police, which is probing the rape case, is screening through the call data records (CDR) of the accused and the woman to ascertain how long they knew each other. 'The accused is giving contradictory statements. Sometimes he says he met the woman on a dating app, sometimes he claims to know her through a counselling app. This needs to be investigated. We are also trying to know whether the accused used sleeping pills to spike the food and water offered to the woman,' a senior police officer involved in the probe said. In her complaint to the police on July 12, the woman, who claimed to be a psychologist, had alleged that Toppaunwar called her to the Joka campus a day ago for a 'counselling session', and the two had met on social media. The woman alleged that she lost consciousness and was raped after she consumed spiked food and water offered by the accused on a hostel room.
India Today
6 days ago
- India Today
Supreme Court sees 'wild romanticism' in fiance murder, pauses woman's life term
In a judgment advocating for 'reformative justice', the Supreme Court put on hold the life sentence of a woman convicted of killing her fiance with help from her boyfriend and two others, observing that "mental rebellion and wild romanticism" led to a catastrophic case dates back to December 3, 2003, when BV Girish, a 26-year-old software engineer from Bengaluru, was brutally murdered after a dinner outing with his fiance, Shubha Shankar, a 20-year-old law sets this judgment apart is how despite the close scrutiny of the 'astounding' evidence against the accused persons, the Supreme Court refused to close its eyes to the deeper, human dimensions of the tragedy. The judgment, pronounced by the bench of Justices MM Sundresh and Aravind Kumar characterises Shubha as a young woman 'muffled by a forced family decision' and suffering immense internal turmoil as her ambitions were thwarted by IS THE CASE?Shubha and Girish got engaged on November 30, 2003 following an arrangement by their families, who were neighbours and held cordial the night of the incident, after dinner, the couple stopped at Air View Point to watch airplanes land. While they were parked at the viewpoint, Girish was attacked and fatally struck on the head multiple times with a steel rod by an unknown with the help of bystanders, took Girish to the hospital, where he was declared dead the following the case was registered against unknown persons. However, investigations uncovered a conspiracy involving Shubha herself, her close friend Arun Verma, his cousin Dinesh, and their associate Venkatesh, who was identified as the by Shubha's reluctance to marry Girish and her closeness with Arun, the four were accused of orchestrating and executing the crime. They were arrested in January 2004, tried, and eventually convicted for murder and criminal Karnataka High Court too, dismissed the appeals of the accused persons challenging their convictions and upheld the sentence. The matter then reached the Supreme SUPREME COURT OBSERVEDThe Supreme Court undertook a "studied scrutiny of the charges, along with the evidence placed on record", and heard arguments at considerable length from both sides. The court said that its foundational duty is to "make an endeavour and find out the truth".The call data records obtained from the accused persons played a crucial role in their conviction. The Supreme Court, on close scrutiny of the evidence found the CDR data to be "astounding", revealing an extensive and unusual pattern of communications among the and SMSes from October 2003 through December 2003 were analysed, and the top court noted spikes in communication frequency, particularly between Shubha and Arun, often at "odd hours of the night," even while Shubha was engaged to the deceased and present at her engagement the basis of the call records, the court also noted the active entry of Arun's cousin into the conspiracy on November 25, 2003, by making multiple direct calls to Shubha, who was then a complete stranger to him. It took note of the "dramatic rise" in communication between Arun and Shubha, with 56 exchanges on the day before the the day of the incident, there were 54 communications between Arun and Shubha, primarily through SMSes, exchanged continuously while Shubha was with the deceased. This, the court said, supported the prosecution's theory that Shubha was providing Arun real-time updates on their bench found the "sudden silence" in communication between Arun and Shubha immediately after the incident and her unusual choice not to inform Arun about the incident, as crucial evidence of conspiracy. The tower location data also added "muscle" to the prosecution's case by placing Arun's cousin and his friend in close proximity to the crime NOT PUNISHMENTDespite the towering evidence, the Supreme Court did not cloak its decision in mere procedural rigour. Instead, it took the path of reformative justice.'This unfortunate event would not have occurred, had the family been more sympathetic in understanding the mental predilection and disposition of Shubha,' the judgment court recognised that the line between perpetrator and victim can blur when societal pressures push the vulnerable toward desperate, sometimes even disastrous, choices."A mere punishment per se would not constitute a remedy for an act of crime. It might change the offender's legal or social status, but would not be sufficient to address the root cause of his actions or remove the psychological and emotional factors that made him commit the idea is to reform and rehabilitate the convict to bring him back into the fold of society, the bench court based this on the Constitution stating, 'The Constitution of India, 1950... which is the supreme law of the land, encourages the reformation of individuals, by granting them a new lease of life. This is personified by Articles 72 and 161 of the Constitution which empowers the constitutional authorities to grant pardon to convicts.'advertisementIn the concluding paragraphs of the judgment, the Supreme Court said, 'We do not wish to end our judgment by merely rendering a conviction. We do believe that this Court has a little more role to play."The bench said considering that the judgment began by noting that the unfortunate event would not have occurred, had Shubha's family been more sympathetic in understanding her mental predilection, it is crucial that the Court makes certain court observed that Shubha was unable to make a decision for herself, despite being an adult woman. While clearly refusing to condone her actions and upholding her conviction, it said that Shubha was made to commit this offence by adopting the wrong course of action in order to address her problem.'The appellants, who committed the offence with adrenaline pumping in their veins, have now reached the middle age,' the bench said. 'Two out of the four accused persons were teenagers at the time of occurrence, while Shubha had barely crossed that phase They were not born as criminals, but it was an error of judgment through a dangerous adventure which led to the commission of a heinous crime.'advertisementThe Supreme Court said it is important to facilitate the accused persons' right to seek pardon by permitting them to approach the Karnataka arrest and life sentence of the accused was suspended by the top court for 8 weeks to grant them time to file their petitions before the Governor.- EndsTune InMust Watch
