The Supreme Court has awarded the Yadav cousins, Vikas Yadav and Vishal 25 years jail for the abduction and murder of 25-years-old Nitish Katra in 2002. Their associate Sukhdev Pehalwan has been granted 20 years in prison.

The Yadav cousins had appealed against the order of the Delhi High Court, which sentenced Yadavs to 25 years in jail without remission and their aide to 25 years, with an additional five years each for destruction of evidence in February last year.

Nitish Kumar had been abducted and burned to death in 2002 in Ghaziabad near the city. Reports said he was dating     Bharti Yadav, the daughter of a politician D P Yadav. Bharati’s brother Vikas Yadav and cousin Vishal had abducted Mr Katara, when he was in a wedding with Bharati.

Nitish Katara’s mother Neelam Katara was fighting against the injustice to her son, said that she was satisfied that the court had upheld many more years of punishment for her sons killers than the 14 years usually awarded in a life sentence.

Ms. Katara said, “We wanted the death sentence, but am happy that the court acknowledged that this was not normal murder but an honor killing by rich people drunk on power. Of course I wish they had got 10 years more. The evidence they destroyed was my son's body, not a pair of slippers.”

By calling it an honor killing the High Court said the crime was in the ‘rarest of rare category’ and awarded the convicts a lengthy term. The court, however, refused the request of the prosecution to grant the convicts a death sentence by clarifying that the reformation and rehabilitation is not ‘unforseeably forcelosed’.

By Prajakt K