MINOR’S RAPE, MURDER: POCSO COURT AWARDS DEATH SENTENCE TO ACCUSED

SASARAM: A special Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) court on Friday awarded capital punishment to an accused in the rape and murder case of a 10-year-old girl in November last year.

The court also ordered the state government to pay ₹8 lakh to the kin of the victim as compensation.

On November 14 last, the accused, Baliram Singh (45), a married man and resident of Gangoli village under Dehri police station limits, raped the minor in his house after luring her on account of showing her idols of deities.

The accused strangulated the minor and killed her after she started crying and bleeding profusely. He then hid the body in a box. The village residents, however, caught the man on suspicion and handed him over to the police. He confessed to the crime during interrogation, after which police recovered the minor’s body. The man was arrested and sent to jail.

A case under Sections 376 (punishment for rape), 302 (punishment for murder) and 201 (disappearance of evidence of offence) of Indian Penal Code and Section 8 (punishment for sexual assault of a minor) of POCSO Act was registered by the victim’s grandmother. The charge sheet in the case was filed on November 20, 2020.

Declaring it as the “rarest of rare criminal acts”, the court awarded capital punishment to the accused, special public prosecutor, Hira Prasad Singh, said.

Senior advocate RP Singh represented the accused.