New Delhi: The Supreme Court Monday awarded a compensation of Rs 3.50 lakh to an acid victim from Vizianagaram in Andhra Pradesh, and slapped a one-year imprisonment on the accused.
The Hyderabad high court for AP and Telangana had let off the accused, Gorripottu Eshwara Rao, with one-month imprisonment and Rs 6,000 fine for the offence committed in May 2003.
A Bench of justices Dipak Misra and R. Banumathi directed the AP government to pay Rs 3 lakh to the victim, Ravada Sasikala, within three months; Rs 50,000 has to be paid by the accused within six months.
Pulling up the high court for showing leniency on the accused, the Bench said the case is an example of an “uncivilised and heartless crime”.
The apex court said it unacceptable to allow the concept of leniency in such a crime. “A crime of this nature does not deserve any kind of clemency. It is individually as well as collectively intolerable,” the Bench said.
It said the accused might have felt that his ego had been hurt by the girl’s denial to his proposal for marriage, or he might have suffered a “sense of hollowness” to his “exaggerated sense of honour”, but the criminal act does not deserve any leniency.
“The approach of the high court shocks us, and we have no hesitation in saying so. When there is medical evidence that there was an acid attack on the young girl, and the circumstances (along with) evidence (are strong)… there was no justification to reduce the sentence to the period of 30 days already undergone,” the Bench said.
The court said it was at a loss to understand whether the judge has been guided by some unknown notion of mercy or has remained oblivious of the precedents relating to this sentence. When a substantive sentence of 30 days is imposed in the case of the acid attack on a young girl, justice is not served, it said.
“If we allow ourselves to say so, (it) is not only ostracised, but also is… wholly impermissible,” the apex court said and set aside the high court verdict, following which it restored the sentence of one-year imprisonment imposed by the trial court in Vizag.
