Eight sentenced to death for murdering college student

Terming the murder of Sourav Chowdhury, a rarest of the rare incident, Barasat District Court on Tuesday has pronounced death sentence to eight and life imprisonment to one who were held guilty by the court on April 15. 

Another three persons were given five years of rigorous imprisonment by the court as they had provided shelter to the convicts. 

Those who have been sentenced death penalty are Shyamal Karmakar, Suman Sarkar, Suman Das, Somnath Sardar, Tarak Das, Amal Barui, Tapas Biswas and Ratan Samaddar while Rakesh Burman has to serve rigorous life imprisonment. 

The others Sisir Mukherjee, Ratan Das and Poly Maity were sentenced to five years imprisonment by Barasat District and Session Court on Tuesday. The court has also slapped them a fine failing to which their imprisonment will extend up to six years.

Before giving the final judgment, the judicial magistrate had talked to the eight accused who were sentenced to death and also to the other who has to serve life imprisonment. 

A little around 11 am on Tuesday the court has given its final judgment in connection with the murder of Sourav Chaowdhury who was brutally killed.  

It may be mentioned that 21-year-old Chowdhury was a second-year student of Mrinalini Dutta College in Birati and he was killed for protesting against running hooch den near his house at Bamungachi in North 24-Parganas on July 5, 2014. Pieces of his body were found on railway tracks in between Duttapukur and Bamungachi railway stations.

The court on April 15 held the nine accused guilty who were directly involved in the crime under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPS) on charges of murder (302 IPC), kidnapping in order to murder (364 IPC), tampering of evidence (364 IPC) and Criminal Conspiracy (120 (B)). Shyamal has been booked under additional charges of possessing fire arms under sections 25 and 27 of the Arms Act.

One of the arrested persons, Uttam Shikari had turned approver while the other person Anup Talukdar was acquitted of all charges due to lack of evidence. 

Sourav was kidnapped when he was returning after watching a cricket march from a local club. 

The accused led by Shyamal took him to nail factory where he was strangulated with pieces of clothes. Later they had dumped the body on the railway tracks after cutting it into pieces. 

The main accused was arrested from Tarapith after few days where he had taken a shelter. Police had filed the chargesheet in this connection in September 2014 and the trial had started a few days after the chargesheet was filed.

The victim’s family members today expressed happiness as the state government and police had taken a prompts action in arresting the accused. 

“We are happy at the judgement given by the Barasat court. It’s some solace to the departed soul of my brother who was brutally killed by the criminals,” victim’s elder brother said.