A trial court here on Thursday awarded life imprisonment to Sher Singh Rana in the Phoolan Devi murder case.
Rejecting the prosecution’s plea for the death sentence or life imprisonment without remission of sentence, the Additional Sessions Judge Bharat Parashar sentenced him to life imprisonment. The court left it to the government to remit his sentence as per law. The judge said the crime did not fit the definition of rarest of rare case.
It took into account the age of Singh (35), his incarceration for 11 years, and his conduct in prison during the trial and the fact that there was no criminal case pending against him.
The court rejected an argument by Rana’s counsel that he should be awarded a less punishment as Phoolan Devi was sentenced to just 11 years imprisonment for massacring 22 Thakurs in Behmai.
The judge said that argument had no relevance.
