Kuldeep Sengar convicted of culpable homicide of victim’s father

NEW DELHI: A court in Delhi on Wednesday convicted expelled BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar of culpable homicide not amounting to murder in the death of the Unnao rape victim’s father.

District judge Dharmesh Sharma said Sengar had no intention of killing the victim’s father. “He was beaten in a brutal manner that led to his death,” the judge said. The judge also called the doctors who treated the victim’s father as ‘butchers’.

On August 13 last year, the court had charged Sengar, along with his brother Atul Sengar, three policemen and five others with the murder of the victim’s father. The court had on December 20 sent Sengar to jail for the “remainder of his natural biological life” for raping the woman in 2017, when she was a minor.

The rape survivor’s father was assaulted and framed in a case of illegal firearms possession by the MLA and his aides. He died on April 9, 2018, while in judicial custody. This came after a day the victim tried to set herself ablaze near Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s residence in Lucknow to protest alleged police inaction against the MLA, whom she accused of sexually assaulting her. She was airlifted from a hospital in Lucknow to AIIMS in Delhi. The victim has been provided accommodation in Delhi and is under CRPF protection.

NEW DELHI: A Delhi court Wednesday convicted expelled BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar and seven others of culpable homicide, not amounting to murder, of the Unnao rape victim’s father who had died in judicial custody.

District judge Dharmesh Sharma also said the facts and circumstances brought on the record prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused hatched another crucial part of the conspiracy to foist a false case upon the victim by planting a country made gun and four cartridges.

The court said the accused had no intention of killing him. “However, they beat up the victim in a brutal manner that led to his death.”

The judge said it is of common knowledge that “when police hit, they hit in a brutal manner”.

He added that the “doctors at the district hospital were negligent and acted like butchers”.

The court said the accused — Ashok Singh Bhadauria, K P Singh, Kuldeep Singh Sengar, Vineet Mishra, Birendra Singh, Shashi Pratap Singh, Suman Singh and Atul (Sengar’s brother) — are held guilty of committing offence under section 120-B (criminal conspiracy).

The other sections read with it are 166 (public servant disobeying law to cause injury to a person), 167 (public servant framing incorrect document to cause injury), 193 (false evidence), 201 (disappearance of evidence), 211 (false charge of offence made with intent to injure), 218 (public servant framing incorrect record to save person from punishment), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (wrongful restraint) and section 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the IPC.

The court also held the convicted the accused under a section of Arms Act.

While convicting Makhi police station in-charge, Ashok Singh Bhadauria, and Sub Inspector, K P Singh, the court said that “being seasoned police officials, disobeyed the direction of law to protect the life and liberty of the victim when he as well as Kishore Kumar Mishra were being beaten up by the coaccused persons and allowed unlawful restraint being applied by co-accused persons upon victim Surendra Singh, having knowledge or reasons to believe that it might result in death of the victim and ultimately the victim died due to the injuries sustained in the incident...

“They allowed the assailants their protective police cover affording them a free hand to do what they did”.