NEW DELHI:The Delhi High Court on Friday handed down enhanced 30-year life term to Vikas Yadav and his cousin Vishal Yadav convicted in the murder of Nitish Katara, a friend of Vikas’ sister.
The Bench of Justice Gita Mittal and Justice J R Midha also awarded 20 years without remission for Sukhdev Pehalwan, the third convict in the sensational case.
Even as the Bench made it clear that the trio did not deserve remission of the life sentence imposed on them, it rejected the plea of Delhi Police and Katara’s mother Neelam Katara to award the death penalty to the convicted trio.
The court said the planning of crime and post crime conduct is the essential fact that a “life sentence which means only 14 years of imprisonment is grossly inadequate in the present case”.
“Caste divisions are a menace which the society is struggling to eradicate. The motive evinces exceptional depravity, meanness; the crime was socially abhorrent and certainly an aggravating circumstance,” the bench observed.
It also held that the convicts did not consider Nitish’s family as affluent as their own.