‘Does not deserve any sympathy’: Chandigarh court sentences taxi driver to life for 2010 MBA student rape-murder

On Friday, Kumar was produced before the court, where his counsel, advocate Sunil Pandey, sought leniency in punishment. “He is the only support of his mother. He has been serving her, and there is no one to look after her. Also, he stated that he remained in custody since his date of arrest and facing trial of the present case without any fault, and been falsely implicated in other matters,” the counsel submitted.

Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) Maninder Kaur argued that the victim was brutally raped and murdered by the convict, and her parents had waited for justice for almost 15 years as the deceased was their only child. Submitting that the convict was involved in other crimes, the SPP sought that the death penalty be awarded.

The defence counsel contended that the present case does not fall in the category of the rarest of the rare, saying that it was based on circumstantial evidence and there was no direct evidence against the convict, and that he must be given a chance to reform.

The court noted that there were multiple cases pending for trial against Kumar at different courts and held that a requisite sentence has to be imposed upon the convict to protect society as a legitimate response to the collective conscience. “It is an obligation on the court to the society which has reposed faith in the court of law to curtail evil,” the court said.

Stating that it was not the rarest of rare cases that called for capital punishment, the court added, “It is a case of its own kind where a convict was arrested after 14 years of the incident with the efforts of police party and scientist who had examined the samples of deceased and samples of the convict.”

The court held that the present case is not only based on circumstantial evidence, but scientific evidence too. The blood and bodily fluid samples taken from the clothes and body of the deceased were linked to the accused through a DNA profile match, it added.

Praise for officials

Praising the police and Central Forensic Science Laboratory officials for their efforts, the court said that it “really appreciates the efforts of police party, specially Investigating Officer DSP Harditt Singh and SI Mohan Kashyap and Dr. Sunita, Assistant Director/Scientist, who have sincerely performed their duties and contributed to the society at large by collecting evidence against a person, who had remained absconded almost for 14 years after the incident”.

“Judge does not preside over a criminal trial merely to see that no innocent man is punished. A judge also presides to see that a guilty man does not escape. Both are public duties,” the court said.

“The law does not enjoin a duty on the prosecution to lead evidence of such character which is almost impossible to be led or at any rate extremely difficult to be led. The duty of the prosecution is to lead such evidence which it is capable of leading,” the court added.

The 21-year-old MBA student was found murdered in Chandigarh in 2010. On July 30, 2010, she had left her house to attend English-speaking classes but never returned. Her body was found later, following which she was rushed to PGI, where doctors declared her ‘brought dead’.

Kumar, a drug addict, was arrested in 2024 in connection with the rape and murder of another woman in Maloya in 2022. During interrogation, the police claimed, he confessed that he had committed the rape and murder of a woman in 2010 in Chandigarh.

‘I was falsely implicated’

After he was sentenced to life imprisonment, Monu Kumar alleged outside the courtroom that he was falsely implicated in the case because he had an argument with the local police. “The police arrested me in this case…only because I entered into a quarrel with them. I never absconded, I was working in the city,” he said.

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