Two sentenced for gangrape, dacoity

Two men have been sent to 10 years in jail by a Delhi court for gangraping a priest's 19-year-old wife at gunpoint along with their three aides and committing dacoity in temple premises.
Additional Sessions Judge M C Gupta awarded 10 years rigorous imprisonment to 40-year-old Krish Pal and 48-year-old Kamal Das for the offences of gangrape, dacoity and dacoity with an attempt to cause death or grievous hurt under the IPC.
"In the circumstances, it stands clearly established on record, of the performance of the act of sexual intercourse by both the accused Krish Pal and Kamal Das with the woman without her consent," the court said while holding them guilty for the offence of gangrape.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 35,000 each on Delhi resident Krish and Meerut resident Kamal.
Apart from these two convicts, Virender and Sunil Kumar have already been convicted and sentenced by the court for dacoity and gangrape while Raj Pal has been declared a proclaimed offender.
The court said prosecution has succeeded in proving that Krish and Kamal along with Virender and Sunil looted gold ornaments of woman at gunpoint and gangraped her one by one after threatening to kill her in March 2005.

Before gangraping the woman, who had given birth to a girl two months before the incident, the men had entered the temple premises in Begumpur area here by breaking open the lock, beat up the priest and looted several articles, it said.

According to the prosecution, the incident took place on the intervening night of March 18-19, 2005, when the priest was sleeping in the temple while his wife, daughter and his four-year-old brother-in-law were sleeping in the adjacent room.
At 1 AM, Krish, Kamal, Virender, Sunil Kumar and Raj, armed with pistols, gun and swords, broke open the temple door and demanded Rs one lakh from the priest, the police said.
On being told that he did not have any money, they started beating him and tied him with ropes.
Thereafter, they opened the door of another room where the priest's family was sleeping and after looting the gold ornaments of his wife gangraped her, police said.

During the trial, Krish and Kamal claimed they were innocent and falsely implicated in the case.
The court, however, rejected their submission saying there was no reason why the woman and priest would falsely implicate them and the forensic evidence proved their involvement in the crime.