SC to hear plea against death sentence for four-year-old's rape, murder

The Supreme Court will hear on June 10 a plea by Rajasthan resident Kalu Khan seeking the stay of his death sentence for allegedly raping and murdering a four-year-old girl.

A bench of Justice J.S.Khehar and Justice C.Nagappan directing the hearing of the matter after counsel Asha Jain Madan told the court that the execution of Kalu Khan's death sentence is fixed for June 18.

Replying to a query, Madan said the death sentence was confirmed by the Jodhpur bench of Rajasthan High Court on April 9.

The special judge, SC/ST court, Sriganganagar, convicted Kalu Khan and describing his offence as "rarest of rare", sentenced him to death.

According to the prosecution, Kalu Khan, a resident of Sriganganagar, in May 2012 allured the girl from her father Kashiram's house and brought her to his house on the promise of giving her berries. Upon reaching home, he prompted his son Jumman Khan, a minor, to rape her and then followed him in raping the child.

Finding that her condition was deteriorating, Kalu Khan killed her.

The dead body was recovered when the girl's grandfather, searching for her, saw Jumman burying something in a pit in his courtyard. As Jumman failed to give any satisfactory answer as to what he had buried, the pit was dug up and the body recovered.

Kalu Khan, in his petition, said that the offence for which he has been convicted did not come under the rarest of rare category and the only evidence against him was that of the co-accused and his son who was allegedly found to be burying the dead body. Jumman was tried by the Juvenile Justice Board.

He contended that he could not have been awarded death sentence in the facts of the case where the conviction is based solely on circumstantial evidence and neither the murder was pre-planned as held by the trial court nor did he have any criminal past.