Nagpur man sentenced to death for raping and murdering five-year-old girl in 2019

Nagpur:

A man was sentenced to death by a Nagpur court on Monday for raping and murdering a five-year-old girl in 2019.

Sanjay Puri (32) was sentenced to death by District Judge and Extra-Member Justice SR Padwal under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, Section 376(A)(B) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, said Special Public Prosecutor Prashant Kumar Sathianathan.

The girl’s body with severe head injuries was found on December 6, 2019, in a farmland in Linga village of Kalmeshwar tehsil, where she lived with her parents, who worked as labourers. A piece of cloth and a stick were stuffed in her mouth, while a blood-stained boulder lay nearby.

Police investigations revealed that she had been raped and beaten to death. Puri, who worked as a security guard on the farm, was subsequently arrested, the SPP said.

A total of 26 witnesses were questioned in the case, he said.

The court sentenced Puri to life imprisonment under Section 376(2) of the IPC and Section 4 of the POCSO Act and seven years imprisonment under Section 10 of the POCSO Act, Sathianathan said.

All sentences will be served concurrently, the SPP said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)