Man gets death sentence for killing minor step-children

A 27-year-old man was sentenced to death by a court here today for killing his two minor step-children in September 2017 as his wife was not willing to have a child with him.

District and Session Judge B S Sandhu convicted Ashok Kumar alias Pintu, a resident of Baweta village in Ghaziabad district of Uttar Pradesh, for the murder of Manav (10) and Shivam (6) and awarded him capital punishment, saying the crime fell in the category of "rarest of rare" case.

Kumar had married a local resident Rajni who had two sons from her previous marriage. He wanted have a child with Rajni but she refused. Annoyed over it, he kidnapped her sons and drowned the children in a river on September 25, 2017, according to the prosecution.

The court also sentenced Kumar to ten years rigorous sentence and a fine of Rs 10,000 for kidnapping the children and five years imprisonment and a fine of Rs 5,000 for disposing of their dead bodies, said complainant Rajni's counsel Mohit Supra.