Madurai: Industrialist and owner of educational institutions S A Raja and four others accused of killing Minister Aladi Aruna and his friend, were sentenced to double life imprisonment by the Madurai Bench of the High Court on Wednesday.
The trial court had earlier acquitted five of the eight accused, including Raja and Arumugam.
The prosecution said Aladi Aruna, former law minister in the DMK government, and his friend Ponraj, a teacher, were hacked to death by a gang on December 21, 2004, when they were walking along a road in Alangudi in Tirunelveli district. Police registered a case against eight persons, including Raja and they were tried by the Tirunelveli district court.
The court found three of the accused guilty.
Two of them Balamurugan and Alagar were sentenced to death and Veldurai was awarded three years imprisonment with a fine of Rs 5,000.
Raja, Arumugam, Kannan, Archunan and Paramasivam were acquitted. Balamurugan, Alagar and Veldurai appealed against their sentence.
The prosecution appealed against the acquittal of Raja and others and also sought enhancement of the sentence awarded to Veldurai.
The appeals came up for hearing before a Division Bench comprising justices R Bhanumathi and R Mala. The Bench held that the documents produced in the court and the evidence of witnesses showed beyond doubt that the murders had been committed due to trade rivalry and it had been proved that Raja and Arumugam were involved in the conspiracy to murders. Quashing the verdict of acquittal, the Bench awarded double life sentence to Raja and Arumugam with a fine of Rs 5,000 each. The Bench also quashed the death sentence awarded to Balamurugan and Alagar and the three year sentence of imprisonment to Veldurai and awarded all three of them double life sentence.