Surinder Koli gets death penalty in sixth case

A special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Ghaziabad on Friday awarded capital punishment to Surendra Koli in the sixth case related to the Nithari killings. Koli has been found guilty of murdering Nanda Devi in the 2006 case.

The case relates to Nanda Devi, a 25-year-old who hailed from Nepal and served as a domestic help at Moninder Singh Pandher’s Noida house before disappearing on October 31, 2006. 

The hearing in the sixth case started in 2013 and Koli was held guilty after the prosecution produced 50 witnesses in the case. The quantum of punishment was to be pronounced on October 7. 

Koli was held guilty of abduction, rape, murder and destruction of evidence in the case.

According to the charge-sheet filed by the CBI, the woman had stopped working at Pandher’s house in August 2006 as she was in an advanced stage of pregnancy.

A day before she disappeared, Koli had called her and asked her to rejoin the work. On October 31, 2006, she left her house at 7am and told her husband that she would go to Pandher’s house to meet Koli as he had offered her to resume the work. She never returned.

Earlier, the Supreme Court had sought the response of Koli on a plea of the Uttar Pradesh Government against the Allahabad High Court’s verdict that commuted his death penalty to life term. Koli is also accused of gruesome killing of Rimpa Halder.

He is also the accused of sexually assaulting girls before killing them, and allegedly eating them. The case came into light when two Nithari residents hinted his involvement in the disappearance of several children over the past two years since 2004.

The case was further strengthened when carcasses of children were found in the drain outside the house of businessman Moninder Singh Pandher, where Koli worked as a servant.

On February 13, 2009, Koli was sentenced to death by a special CBI court in Ghaziabad. In the first of the Nithari cases, related to another victim, in February, 2009, both Koli and Pandher were awarded death penalty. Following an appeal, Pandher was acquitted of all charges by the Allahabad high court while Koli’s punishment was upheld.

On January 28, this year, the Allahabad High Court had commuted the death sentence awarded to Koli to life term in the murder of 14-year-old Rimpa Haldar. Koli was sentenced to death by a special CBI court in Ghaziabad on February 13, 2009.