The Thane Sessions Court on Friday convicted four men arrested in four separate cases of sexual offences against minors registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, sentencing two of them to be hanged until death and the other two to life imprisonment.
In the first case, Ramkirit Goud, a Thane resident, was convicted for the abduction, rape, and murder of a three-year-old girl from Thane, and was sentenced to death. According to the Kasar Wadavli police, the case was registered on September 30, 2013, after the victim went missing while playing outside her house. Her body was found in a pit filled with water in Thane, and the police arrested Goud on October 3, 2013.
Deputy Superintendent of Police Mandar Dharmadhikari, Dahanu division, who was at the time a police inspector at Kasar Wadavli and the investigating officer of the case, said the conviction was the result of the detailed investigation and the strong evidence presented in the court. “Every single point in the charge sheet was corroborated with evidence. Even the mud found on the shoes of the accused was matched with the mud at the spot where the victim’s body was found. We presented 16 witnesses and all of them testified, despite the time lapse between the offence and the trial,” Mr. Dharmadhikari said.
The second case, which got a death penalty verdict, was registered by the Bhoiwada police in Bhiwandi on April 1, 2018, when a four-year-old girl went missing from near her residence. Her body was found in a severely decomposed condition in an open field close to her house on April 4. The police arrested Mohammed Abed Sheikh (20), a loom worker staying in the same locality, from near the Indo-Nepal border the same month.
Senior police inspector Rajendra Mayane, Hill Line police station, was at the time a police inspector posted at Bhoiwada and was appointed as the investigating officer of the case. Mr. Mayane recalled how Sheikh was nabbed a day before he was to cross the border. “From the constables who pounded the pavement to the local residents who helped us with clues to the doctors and forensic experts who provided us with corroborative evidence, everyone had an equal role in securing Friday’s conviction,” Mr. Mayane said.
Meanwhile, the accused in two other cases were convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment.
Hafeez Pathan, a Mumbra resident, was arrested on December 19, 2018, in connection with the sexual assault and murder of an eight-year-old boy from his locality. The investigation found that Pathan had lured the victim away from his house by offering him money to buy a kite and had instead taken him to the forest area in Mumbra, where he forced himself on the victim and then strangled him. The court sentenced Pathan to life imprisonment and imposed a fine of ₹26,000.
In the second case, which was registered by the Vartak Nagar police in March 2018, the victim was found crying by the roadside at Azad Nagar in Thane by locals. A joint team of officers from four police stations in the area arrested the accused, Suman Jha, within 24 hours of the case being registered and filed a charge sheet against him. The court convicted Jha and sentenced him to life imprisonment.
