SC awards 36 yrs jail term to man for sodomising, killing boy

The Supreme Court today awarded a rare jail term of 36 years without remission to a man for strangulating a 10-year-old boy to death after sodomising him.

Reducing the death sentence of the convict to 30 years in jail in addition to the period already undergone which is six years, the bench said it is not a rarest of rare case but fixed the lengthy jail term for the "brutal, grotesque, diabolical and dastardly" act.

"We are of the view that incarceration of a further period of 30 years, without remission, in addition to the sentence already undergone, will be an adequate punishment in the facts and circumstances of the case, rather than death sentence," a bench headed by justice K S Radhakrishnan said.

"We have no doubt in our mind that such types of crimes preceded by pederasty are extremely brutal, grotesque diabolical and revolting, which shock the moral fiber of the society, especially when the passive agent is a minor," the bench said.

The apex court upheld the conviction of Anil alias Anthony Arikswamy Joseph under various sections of the IPC and awarded the sentence considering that he was 35 years old and a father of a child at the time of committing the offence eight years ago. Anil has been behind the bars since 2008.

"Accused is now around 42 years of age and when he committed the crime, he was about 35 years. We have clearly found that there is no mitigating circumstance favouring the accused. Age is not a factor favouring him.

By the age of 35, a person attains sufficient maturity and can distinguish what is good or bad, and there is nothing to show that he was under any emotional or mental stress and the offence was committed only to satisfy his lust, in a perverted way," it said. 

The bench noted that the victim was the only child of a woman who worked as a maid and the boy was snatched in a barbaric gruesome manner only to satisfy the perverted lust of the accused.

"Indian society and also the international society abhor pederasty, an unnatural sex, i.e. carnal intercourse between a man and a minor boy or a girl. When the victim is a minor, consent is not a defence, irrespective of the views expressed at certain quarters on consensual sex between adults," the bench said.

"The murder was committed in an extremely brutal, grotesque, diabolical and dastardly manner and the accused was in a dominating position and the victim was an innocent boy, the only son of his mother.

"Accused was aged 35 years when the crime was committed that is he was a fully matured person. Life of a boy, the only son of the mother, was taken away in a gruesome and barbaric manner which pricks not only the judicial conscience but also the conscience of the society," it said.