Kolkata, March 6 The Calcutta High Court has upheld the life sentence of a convict for killing his pregnant wife, holding that he took two lives in cold blood.
Rejecting an appeal by the convict, a division bench presided over by Justice Rajasekhar Mantha said that the conviction of Ram Chandra Pramanik by the Howrah sessions court need not be interfered with.
Sampa Pramanik, who was married to the convict for 10 years, was killed on January 21, 2014 with a blunt weapon and was subsequently strangled.
The division bench, also comprising Justice Rai Chattopadhyay, said that the victim was admittedly 18 weeks pregnant when she was murdered, and it must be presumed that the husband was aware of her condition.
The court said that while it is true that some alcohol was found in the victim's viscera as per the post-mortem report and she might have been slightly inebriated, this cannot be a justification for the appellant to repeatedly assault his wife with the blunt weapon.
"Therefore, the appellant has taken two lives. He was reckless and inhuman," the division bench observed in its judgment on Thursday.
Observing that the appellant "is a cold-blooded killer", the court noted that the assault on the victim indicates that it happened for at least 20 to 30 minutes, leading to her death.
The trial court has rightly sentenced and convicted the appellant under Section 302 of the IPC.
The Additional Sessions Judge, 2nd Court, Howrah, sentenced Pramanik to life imprisonment in March, 2017 after convicting him under Section 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).