January 17, 2013: A fast track court in India’s New Delhi gave death sentence to a
farmhouse guard for raping and killing a 3-year-old girl in 2011. The judgment comes
ten days after fast track courts were set up in the national capital to try cases
of sexual offences against women following the gang-rape of a paramedical student
in a moving bus leading to a public outcry.
Terming the crime as "most diabolic
and gruesome", additional sessions judge Virender Bhat handed over the sentence to
Bharat Singh. Bhat said that the case fell in the "rarest of rare" category. The victim
had died while she was being raped and her internal organs had come out, the court
said.
"There is a steep rise in crimes against women, particularly minor girls.
Time has come when the courts have to take a stern view of such crimes and inflict
harsher punishment possible upon the perpetrators... so that a stern message is sent
to society," the court added.
The incident happened on April 10, 2011 when
the girl was returning to her house in Kapashera in southwest Delhi when she strayed
towards the farmhouse. The girl was called inside by Singh, who was alone on duty,
and was raped by him, the prosecution had said.
The court noted that the girl
was subjected to his "lust" in such a "ghastly" manner that she died during the crime.
The convict was so merciless that after the girl died he threw her body in some bushes
inside the farmhouse.