Mumbai: A Mumbai court on Thursday convicted all the five people accused in two separate gang rape cases.
The Sessions Court handed down guilty verdicts for the rape a 22-year-old photojournalist working of a city magazine as well as a 18-year-old telephone operator who was attacked in a derelict Shakti Mills compound last year. Two juveniles also accused in the crime are yet to be tried.
Sentences in both the cases will be announced on Friday.
The entire case was investigated and the verdict delivered within the fastest time possible as the crime sent shock waves and outrage across the city.
Principal Session Judge Shalini Phansalkar Joshi found Vijay Jadhav, 19, Mohammad Qasim Shaikh, 21, and Mohammad Ansari, 28, guilty for both the gang-rape cases. The court also found Siraj Khan guilty in the gang-rape of the photojournalist and Mohammad Ashfaque Shaikh, 26, guilty of the telephone operator gang-rape case in the same compound earlier on July 31 last year.
On August 22, a photojournalist and her male colleague had visited the dilapidated Shakti Mills in central Mumbai as a part of their assignment. The accused initially offered them to show the way but later threatened to book them for trespassing on railway land. A group of men then tied the journalist’s male colleague with a belt and each took turns in raping the girl.
Following the incident and police working round-the-clock to apprehend the culprits, the 18-year-old rape survivor came forward to register a police complaint that she was also gang-raped in the same compound by five men, among them three of the accused arrested three weeks earlier. She and her then boyfriend were trying to take a shortcut through the mills compound. The Mumbai Police filed two different charge sheets which the court clubbed together last October.
The trial of the two juveniles, one in each case, is expected to begin soon before the Juvenile Justice Board, now that the verdict in the case of adults is out. In India, juveniles — offenders under the age of 18 — are tried under the Juvenile Justice Act. Capital punishment or life imprisonment cannot be imposed for offences committed by persons below 18.
Meanwhile, Maharashtra Home Minister R.R. Patil welcomed the court’s verdict and said, “What is heartening is that the court pronounced them as guilty within the shortest span of time after the charge sheets were filed.
“We still believe Mumbai is a safe place for women and the verdict announced by the court will have far reaching consequences and a warning for potential criminals so that such cases are not repeated in future.”
Public prosecutor Ujwal Nikam said this was a very significant verdict for heinous crimes committed against two young women. He will be seeking the maximum punishment possible.
