Kochi: A court in Kerala on Tuesday sentenced to death a man convicted in the horrific rape and murder of a 5-year-old girl at Aluva in July this year.
Special POCSO (Protection Of Children from Sexual Offences) court judge K Soman gave the highest punishment of the land to Ashwaq Alam, a 28-year-old migrant labourer from Bihar, for raping and killing the girl, who also belonged to a migrant labourer family hailing from Bihar.
The sentence was pronounced today, celebrated as Children's Day across the country. The date also marks the 11th anniversary of the POCSO Act, which came into effect on November 14, 2012.
The victim's parents were present in court when the punishment was given to Alam, who was convicted on November 4.
The prosecution had argued that the case falls under the rarest-of-rare category and therefore, the accused didn't deserve any sympathy and that death penalty should be given to the convict.
During arguments on sentence, Alam had claimed in court that the other accused were let go and only he was caught in the case and, beyond that, he did not make any other submission, the prosecution had said.
The court had found Alam guilty of all 16 offences in the charge sheet. Of the 16, five offences are punishable by death, the prosecution had said earlier.
The minor girl was brutally raped and strangulated to death on July 28 after she was abducted from her rented house here.
The body of the girl was found dumped in a stack in a marshy area behind a local market in nearby Aluva and the accused was arrested based on CCTV visuals. Alam was in a highly inebriated condition on the same day.
With inputs from PTI