Palampur ragging case: Four sentenced to seven years rigorous imprisonment

Seven years after government college student Amit Thakur was stabbed to death while preventing the ragging of juniors, a local court has sentenced four youths to seven years rigorous imprisonment.

Additional and district judge, Dharamsala, Rajiv Bhardwaj yesterday held Vikas Chouhan, Sachin Pal, Sourav Sood and his brother Gourav Sood guilty in the case.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs25,000 each on the convicts.

The case of the fifth accused Sanjeev Sharma, who was a minor at the time of incident, has been transferred to a juvenile court.

Amit was attacked outside the Government Degree College, Palampur, 35 kms from here, on August 20, 2003 when he asked the accused to them to stop the ragging of junior students. He died at a hospital in Ludhiana later.

As the Anti-Ragging Act was not framed at the time of the incident, the accused were charged under section 304(2) and section 34 of the IPC, which amounts to culpable homicide not tantamount to murder.

Reacting to the court's verdict, the victim's father Ravinder Thakur, said, "It is only partial justice that I have received, I will continue the legal battle as I have full faith in the judiciary".