The Principal District and Sessions Court here on Thursday awarded life sentences to four persons for murdering an associate of Dalit leader late Pasupathipandian.
According to the prosecution, Gopal alias Gopalakrishnan of Karuppathur, 52, an associate of Pasupathipandian and a State-level functionary of an organisation run by the slain leader, was hacked to death at his firm near Lalapettai on October 6, 2021. Gopalakrishnan, who had several cases pending against him in various police stations, was murdered by Raja, 31, of the same village over dispute in erecting flex boards. Raja engaged henchmen to murder Gopalakrishnan.
The Lalapettai police had filed a case and arrested 11 persons in connection with the case.
R. Shanmuga Sundaran, Principal District and Sessions Judge, who heard case, sentenced Raja, Saravanan, 26, of Vayalur, Sundar alias Mavudipet Sundar, 36, and Ravi alias ‘bomb’ Ravi, 26, to life imprisonment and imposed a fine of ₹10,000 on each of them. The judge awarded two years imprisonment to Suresh and Nandakumar and acquitted four others in the case.
The accused were brought from Central Prisons at Cuddalore and Tiruchi and produced before the judge on Thursday.
