A special court in Hoshiarpur on Friday awarded the death penalty to Nanke Yadav, a native of Uttar Pradesh, holding him guilty of sexually abusing and subsequently murdering a 5-year-old boy in September last year.
The court also pronounced other statutory sentences and fines under various sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. The incident had triggered a backlash against the migrant community. Protests were held across the state with several panchayats passing resolutions against the migrant community. The incident had also revived the demand to check the flow of and settlement of non-Punjabis in the state.
The family had shifted to Hoshiarpur from their native Bhanaoke village near Phagwara to make a better living, a few months before the tragic incident.
Additional public prosecutor Nitin Beri and advocate Ashwani Kumar Verma represented the complainant family. “We cannot get our son back but the death sentence to his killer brings some relief. The convict was awarded death penalty under Section 103 of the BNS, 10-year rigorous imprisonment with fine of ₹ 5,000 under Section 140 (1), seven-year rigorous imprisonment and a fine of ₹ 5,000 under Section 238 of the BNS, 2-year rigorous imprisonment under Section 6 of POCSO Act and five-year rigorous imprisonment and a fine of ₹ 5,000 under 10 of the PCSO Act.
The convict was apprised of the sentence through video call as he was not brought to the court due to security reasons.
The victim’s family was awarded ₹ 5 lakh compensation under the Punjab government’s “victims or their dependents compensation scheme”. The victim’s father said the verdict had done justice to the family. Real justice will be met when the convict is actually hanged,” he said.
“The case in hand relates to the brutal murder of a five-year-old boy, after commission of sodomy by accused in an extremely brutal, gruesome and diabolical manner. The case comes under the rarest of rare category and a fit case for death sentence. There is no ground for sympathy for the convict,” the court stated in its order.
