A local court has sentenced two men to life imprisonment for stabbing a 20-year-old street vendor to death after he refused to give them cigarettes on credit.
They were also awarded two years’ jail for criminal intimidation. All sentences will run concurrently. The victim, Prince, ran a lemonade stall in Sector 82, while his father operated a cigarette stall next to it. Additional sessions judge Neetika Verma convicted Bhupinder and Rinku under Sections 302 (murder) and 506 (criminal intimidation), read with Section 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code.
In its judgment, the court relied on the testimonies of Mukhtiar and Abhay, who had witnessed the attack. It noted that both remained firm during cross-examination and that their relationship with the deceased was not, by itself, sufficient reason to discredit their testimony.
The court also relied on the forensic report, which confirmed the presence of human blood on the recovered knife. The court imposed a fine of ₹ 50,000 on each convict. In case of payment default, each will have to undergo an additional six months’ behind bars. Rejecting the defence arguments regarding the delay in registering the FIR, the absence of independent witnesses and the non-availability of closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera footage, the judge held that the prosecution had proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. The court observed that the two convicts had shared a common intention, with one restraining Prince while the other stabbed him. the court rejected the convicts’ plea for leniency on the grounds that they were first-time offenders and their families depended on them While deciding the sentence. It observed that no special circumstances had been established to warrant a lenient view.
