The Supreme Court has upheld the death sentence of a “hot tempered” and “dictatorial” husband who set ablaze his wife and their three children after a domestic row.
A bench of justices Markandeya Katju and C. K. Prasad agreed with the concurrent findings of the sessions court and the Bombay High Court that the convict Ajitsingh Harnamsingh Gujral, a businessman, deserved death penalty as his offence fell under the “rarest of rare” crime category warranting the extreme punishment.
The apex court rejected the plea of defence counsel Jaspal Singh that since no motive was established and as there was no eye witness, the conviction cannot be sustained.
“From their testimony (witnesses), it is evident that the appellant was a dictatorial personality who wanted to dominate over his family and was also hot tempered. He would even beat his wife (deceased) with a leather belt.
“As to what motivated the appellant to commit this gruesome and ghastly act is impossible for us to say because the court cannot enter into the mind of a human being and find out his motive. We can only speculate,” Justice Katju, writing the judgement, said.
On the night of April 10, 2003, Gujral had poured kerosene on his wife Kanwaljeet Kaur, son Amandeep Singh (20) and daughters Neetia (22) and Taniya (13) and set them ablaze after a row with Kaur.
The victims were charred to death on the spot. The couple were married for 27 years and according to the prosecution Gujral was prone to frequently lose his temper and beat his wife with a leather belt.
The apex court said though there was no eyewitness, the fact that Gujaral was last seen with his family four hours before the incident clearly established his involvement.
The bench rejected the contention of Gujral that he had gone by car to Delhi from Mumbai to meet his his sister who was in a serious condition owing to cancer.
“In our opinion, since the accused was last seen with his wife and the fire broke out about 4 hours thereafter, it was for him to properly explain how this incident happened, which he has not done. Hence, this is one of the strong links in the chain connecting the accused with the crime.
“When a person living in Mumbai receives a message that his relative is critical in Delhi, he would have ordinarily take a flight from Mumbai to Delhi and would not go by car, which journey would take several days.
“A flight from Mumbai to Delhi takes two hours. There was no shortage of money with the appellant as he was found with cash of Rs.7,68,080,” the apex court said.
The bench said Gujral, who was bound to protect his family, had resorted to the savage act and hence deserved no mercy.
“In our opinion, a person like the appellant who, instead of doing his duty of protecting his family, kills them in such a cruel and barbaric manner cannot be reformed or rehabilitated. The balance sheet is heavily against him and accordingly we uphold the death sentence awarded to him,” the bench said.
The apex court said the convict did not act on spur of the moment or under any provocation as he had brought a large quantity of petrol into his residential apartment, which shows that he had pre—planned the diabolical and gruesome murder in a dastardly manner.
“In our opinion, a distinction has to be drawn between ordinary murders and murders which are gruesome, ghastly or horrendous. While life sentence should be given in the former, the latter belongs to the category of rarest of rare cases and hence death sentence should be given.
Only legislature can abolish
“It is only the legislature which can abolish the death penalty and not the courts. As long as death penalty exists in the statute book, it has to be imposed in some cases, otherwise it will tantamount to repeal of the death penalty by the judiciary. It is not for the judiciary to repeal or amend the law as that is in the domain of the legislature,” the bench added.
