HC upholds man's life term for setting ablaze wife

The Delhi High Court has upheld the life imprisonment awarded to a man for setting ablaze his wife, saying that the trial court was right in relying on the victim's dying declaration.
A division bench of justices Pradeep Nandrajog and Mukta Gupta upheld the life term given to Delhi resident Shailender by a trial court here in 2010 and dismissed his appeal.
"The totality of the evidence compels us to accord our approval to the view taken by the trial judge. The appeal is dismissed," the bench held.
"The fact that there was past acrimony between the two would be indicative of the fact that in a fit of rage, the appellant set his wife on fire...," it said.

Shailender was awarded rigorous imprisonment for life by the trial court which had also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on him on September 15, 2010 under section 302 (murder) of IPC.
He had approached the high court challenging his conviction on the ground that burnt clothes of his wife were seized but were not sent for forensic examination and kerosene oil was also not detected on her scalp hairs.

According to the prosecution, Shailender was married to Manju in 1996 and had two children. Initially, the couple lived happily but after a year, he started harassing her under the influence of alcohol.

He used to beat his wife and in 2007, she had lodged a complaint with the police.
On the intervening night of April 22-23, 2008, Shailender had a quarrel with his wife. Thereafter, he brought a can of kerosene oil from the kitchen and poured it on Manju and set her on fire, it said.
Manish Kumar, the couple's son who was sleeping in the adjacent room, woke up on hearing the commotion and rushed to the house of his maternal grandfather, who lived nearby, and told him about the incident, it added.
An ambulance was called which took her to LNJP Hospital where she died the next afternoon.