Chhattisgarh man gets death for 3-yr-old’s rape, murder last yr

RAIPUR: A 25-year-old man was sentenced to death on Monday for the rape and murder of a three-and-a-half-year-old girl in Rajnandgaon district of Chhattisgarh in August last year.
The sexual assault was so barbaric that even seasoned policemen were shaken. “What he did to the little child was beyond brutal. She died of excessive bleeding,” the then Rajnandgaon SP D Shrawan had said.After killing the toddler and shoving her body under a cot, the rapist had joined her parents to look for her.
“When a child is raped, her soul is murdered and when she’s physically killed, it’s her body,” Pocso court judge Shailesh Sharma said in his 120-page judgment.
The crime was committed during Ganesh Chaturthi last year, and the judgment at the same time this year.
Special government prosecutor for Pocso, Parwez Akhtar, told TOI that it’s the first time a Pocso court in Rajndandgaon handed out a death sentence. DNA test proved to be the clincher. “We had sought forensic DNA tests of accused Shekhar Korram. It was matched and verified,” the lawyer said.
The crime took place on August 23, 2020, when villagers were in festive mood. The toddler was playing on her own outside the house, and after a while, her parents suddenly realized she was missing.
After checking with friends and neighbours, they raised the alarm. A group of villagers set out to look for her. The rapist-killer was among them, acting concerned, say police. When they couldn’t find the child, her parents informed police.
Realising a child’s life was at stake, police began a house-to-house search. They got suspicious when they found a man at a friend’s house, drunk and looking nervous. They asked around and some locals remembered him talking to the child earlier in the evening.
Police searched his house and found the nude body of the little girl, shoved under a cot, and lying in a puddle of blood. He was arrested.
(The victim's identity has not been revealed to protect her privacy as per Supreme court directives on cases related to sexual assault)