HC upholds death for AIADMK killers

The trio had burnt alive three students in 2000

CHENNAI: The Madras high court upheld on Thursday the death sentence awarded by a lower court to three AIADMK members for burning alive three students of the Tamil Nadu Agricultual University in Dharmapuri. Kokilavani, Gayathri and Hemalatha were burnt to death hours after a special court convicted AIADMK leader Jayalalithaa in the Pleasant Stay Hotel case on February 2, 2000.

Justices D Murugesan and V Periyakaruppaiah termed the crime committed by Nedunchezhian (41), Ravindran (44) and Muniyappan (52) “ghastly, diabolical and gruesome” and held that “undue sympathy to impose inadequate sentence would do more harm to the judicial system and undermine public confidence in the efficacy of law”.

It has been proved that one of the accused poured petrol inside the bus, another set it on fire and the third instigated the act, the judgment said.

“Various judgments of the Supreme Court show imposition of death penalty is resorted to in the rarest of rare cases. The offence must be ghastly, diabolical and gruesome and imposition of life sentence is the rule and death sentence can only be an exception Keeping with the law laid down by the Supreme Court, we have every reason to hold that the offence was diabolical, ghastly, brutal and gruesome,” the court held.

The court said: “The accused had poured petrol through the front side door and (the) front (side of the vehicle) and set it on fire, despite (of) repeated requests by the inmates (students in the bus) to allow them to get out from the bus. The intention of the accused to set the bus on fire was obviously to murder all (the) inmates in the bus to teach a lesson to somebody.”

A sessions court in Salem had on February 16 awarded death sentence to the three AIADMK members and seven years imprisonment to 25 others in the case.

arunram@dnaindia.net