New Delhi: The Supreme Court has temporarily stopped the death sentence of a 30-year-old man named Rahul Kumar, who was found guilty of raping and killing a 19-year-old engineering student in Ranchi, Jharkhand. A group of judges, Justices Surya Kant, Pankaj Mithal, and Ujjal Bhuyan, have requested the trial and high court documents in their translated form. This means that the death penalty is on hold for now.
On September 9, the Jharkhand High Court confirmed the death sentence handed down to Kumar by a lower court. The horrifying crime happened on December 15, 2016. Three years later, in December 2019, Kumar was sentenced to death.
The High Court described the case as extremely shocking, saying that a promising young woman’s life was taken in a terrible way. The court shared details from the autopsy report, which provides evidence of the brutal act. Kumar had planned the crime, bringing tools like an electric wire to strangle the victim and lubricant oil to set her body on fire afterward.
The judge noted that the strangulation was so severe that the wires embedded into her neck. After committing the crime, Kumar fled the scene. The High Court criticized him, saying that the crime was not a sudden act but something that was carefully planned.