A local court in Jharkhand has held Ataullah Malik found guilty of raping a five-year-old girl and sentenced him to 25-years of rigorous imprisonment.
According to the reports, the years after the accused Ataullah had raped a 5-year-old girl in the Jugsalai area of Jamshedpur in Jharkhand.
Ataullah Malik, a resident of Jugsalai Gaurishankar Road in Jamshedpur, had abused and raped a 5-year-old girl at her home in April 2019. The Jugsalai Police had registered a case against the accused after the intervention of the court.
The court had found Ataullah guilty of the crime and sentenced him to 25 years of rigorous imprisonment. The accused has been directed to pay a penalty of 55,000 rupees under various sections of the IPC. The court has also ordered a maximum of 7 years imprisonment under the POCSO Act on non-payment of the penalty.
The case was heard by POCSO Special Court Additional Sessions Judge Sanjay Kumar Upadhyay, who directed that the amount be given to the minor victim.
Commutation of death sentence to a rapist of a minor girl sparks outrage
Earlier last month, the apex court’s decision to commute the death sentence of an accused convicted of rape and murder of a minor girl had sparked massive outrage across the country, with questions being raised over the top court’s verdict to grant mercy to an offender of a serious crime.
The Supreme Court had cancelled the death sentence announced upon rape and murder convict Mohd. Firoz. The apex court challenged the legality of the judgement passed by the Madhya Pradesh High Court in Jabalpur in 2014 stating that ‘every sinner has a future.
The three-member bench comprising Justices UU Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Bela M. Trivedi pronounced the order observing that the maximum punishment prescribed may not always be the determinative factor for repairing the crippled psyche of the offender. The bench re-examined the evidence in the case and held a view that the prosecution was very conclusive in order to rule out the possibility of any other hypothesis except the guilt of the accused.
The decision had nevertheless triggered a furore on social media, with many netizens questioning the Supreme Court’s decision to commute the death sentence of a convict who raped a 4-year-old girl and later murdered her.
