Lifer for 8 for murder of doctor

Eight convicts, including a doctor and an expelled CPI-M leader, were sentenced to life imprisonment by a local court here today for the murder of Dr Sushil Pal, a gynaecologist attached with a government hospital, 10 years ago for refusing to terminate a pregnancy.
Four other convicts have been given seven years rigorous imprisonment in the gruesome incident which took place on July 2, 2004.
District and Sessions Judge of Howrah Court Tanmay Gupta sent eight convicts, including expelled CPI-M leader Biswajyoti Bose and Dr Piyali Das, to life imprisonment.
The six others are Shubhonarayan Ghosh, Prahlad Sarkar, Amit Bandyopadhyay, Santosh Agarwal, Mumtaz Ahmed Khan and Surendra Agarwal.

Local CPI-M leader Biswajyoti Bose, who was later expelled from the party, owned the nursing home in Bally where the murder took place.
Five of these guilty were fined Rs 10,000 each and the other three persons Rs 5000 each, failure to which will increase their jail terms by 3 months.

Four others - Jayanta Ghosh, Biswanath Bangsabanik, Rajib Nath and Chandan Dom - were sent to rigorous imprisonment for seven years and fined Rs 2000 each, failure to which will increase their jail terms by 3 months.
Dr Pal, who was attached to the Serampur Walsh Hospital in Hooghly district, was killed in the nursing home in Bally in Howrah district and his body was found from the bank of the Saraswati river in Sankrail.

Dr Pal went missing after leaving his residence on Karaya Road in Kolkata for his workplace at the Walsh Hospital on the fateful day. His body was recovered next day from the riverside in Howrah district.
According to the prosecution, Pal was killed because he refused to abort a five-month pregnancy.
One of the accused committed suicide during the trial.