Acid attack victim's father appeals to enhance sentence of

The father of 23-year-old woman software engineer, who died after an acid attack here in 2012, today appealed to Puducherry government to explore the possibility of filing an appeal in the Supreme Court seeking death penalty for the accused in the case.
Jayapalan, father of Vinothini, was reacting to the June 28 Madras High Court order upholding the life sentence awarded by the trial court to the accused in 2013.
The high court had pulled up the trial court for not considering death sentence and also said it was forced to confirm the life term in absence of an appeal by the Puducherry government seeking enhancement of the sentence.

Jayapalan expressed satisfaction over the high court verdict confirming life sentence on Suresh Kumar, who carried out the brutal acid attack on Vinothini as she turned down his proposal.
"It has observed that the accused should have been awarded death sentence by the lower court. We request the Puducherry government to analyse the possibilities of an appeal in the Supreme Court in this regard," he told reporters here.
After suffering serious injuries, including disfigurement of her face, in the November 12, 2012 attack at a bus stand here, Vinothini succumbed in a Chennai hospital 90 days later.

On August 20, 2013, Karaikal Judicial Magistrate Vaidyanathan sentenced Suresh Kumar to life imprisonment.

He had also slapped another four-and-half years RI and Rs 1 lakh fine on the accused for causing injuries to Vinothini's father during the attack.
However, the accused challenged the verdict in the high court, which upheld the lower court judgement.
Vinothini's mother committed suicide after the trial court verdict while Jayapalan, who was working as a security guard in a private school at Karaikal, has been suffering from depression and is under the care of his brother-in-law.