SC says no mercy to killers

The Supreme Court on Thursday confirmed the death sentence awarded by the trial court and affirmed by the Allahabad High Court to a woman and her paramour for killing seven members of her family including a 10-month-old child.

A three-judge bench of Chief Justice H.l. Dattu and Justices S.A. Bobde and Arun Mishra rejected the plea of the counsel for the appellants to show mercy on them and commute the sentence into life term.

The CJI told the counsel “you are also a mother (of a five-year old) when you have not shown any mercy and killed even a 10-monthold baby of your brother, why should we show you leniency.”

The convicts — Saleem and Shabnam — were in love and wanted to marry. But Shabnam’s family was opposed to it.

The duo drugged the entire family and then hacked them to death in 2008 in Almora in Uttarakhand.