A POCSO court on Friday awarded death penalty to a 20-year-old man for rape and murder of a minor girl.
The verdict by Justice Angul Suresh Chandra Pradhan came six months after the convict, Anama Dehury, a resident of Kangula village, raped and killed the 12-year-old girl.
The girl also lived in the same village.
The POCSO (protection of children from sexual offences) court pronounced the judgement after examining 36 witnesses and evidence, Special Public Prosecutor Saroj Kumar Pattanayak said.
On January 20, the girl was going to give food to her father, who was working in a farm, when Dehury forcibly took her to a forest and raped her, he said.
He later killed the girl as he was afraid of getting caught, he added.
The police arrested Dehury from Kolkata after tracking his mobile phone and filed a charge sheet within a month of the incident, Pattanayak said.
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