Two sex offenders have been sentenced to death in India for gang-raping a young woman and burning her alive in the “rarest of the rare” case that shocked the nation.
The two brothers, reportedly identified as Kalu, 25, and Kanha Kaleblia, 21, were found guilty on Saturday of the rape and murder of the 14-year-old girl in August last year.
The Bhilwara court for Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) also acquitted seven others, including three women, accused of destroying evidence.
Two of the three women are reportedly married to the Kalbeliya brothers and the acquittal will be challenged in the Rajasthan High Court.
Delivering the verdict, Justice Anil Gupta classified the case as “the rarest of the rare.”
Two brothers, reportedly identified as Kalu, 25 (left) and Kanha Kalbeliya, 21 (right), were found guilty on Saturday of the rape and murder of the 14-year-old girl in August last year.
The 14-year-old girl was gang-raped and burnt alive in an oven (pictured) in Bhilwara, Rajasthan, on August 2 last year.
The victim’s distraught parents were also present during the hearing, as her mother screamed, “We have justice.”
‘My daughter got justice today. I couldn’t eat properly in the last few months. Now I will have food in peace,’ she said.
Special public prosecutor Mahaveer Singh Kishnawat told reporters that “Kalu and Kanha were sentenced to death.”
‘Magistrate Anil Gupta of the Bhilwara POCSO court found two of the main accused in the incident guilty. The other seven have been acquitted,’ he added.
He also confirmed that the prosecution presented statements from a staggering 43 witnesses, of whom 42 supported their evidence.
The barbaric crime took place on August 2 last year in Bhilwara, Rajasthan, after the unnamed girl left her house to look after her family’s goats before disappearing.
When she couldn’t return home, her family began an urgent search to find her.
Police officials told TOI, ‘The girl’s brother saw several charcoal ovens set up by people of a nomadic community.
They added: ‘Smoke coming from one of the ovens caught his attention and made him suspicious as they were not active at night.
“He rummaged through the kiln with a stick and examined the charred objects.”
Among the objects, she found a bracelet that belonged to her sister, who had tragically given her just a few days before.
A team of forensic experts and police officers rushed to the scene where they discovered body parts, along with remains of the victim’s clothing and shoes.
A police spokesperson confirmed at the time that the girl was alive when she was set on fire.
Court documents also suggested the victim was doused with petroleum-based chemicals before being burned alive.
Deputy Superintendent of Police Kotri Shyam Sundar Bishnoi said a total of 11 people, including two minors, were arrested in the case for their alleged involvement.
“Two main accused, caretakers of the oven, kidnapped the girl when she was going to graze the cattle on the night of August 2,” he said.
‘The two brothers raped her repeatedly for more than four hours. Later, they called her wives, mother and other helpers, who threw the minor alive into the charcoal oven early in the morning of the next day.
“After the incident, they also collected some parts of the minor’s body and threw them into a well near the furnace to destroy the evidence,” Bishnoi said.
The police had filed a 473-page charge sheet against the 11 accused on September 3 last year.
“While the hearing of nine accused was going on in the special POCSO court, the two minors are being heard separately,” officials said.
Former Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot also publicly praised the verdict.
“The court’s decision sentencing the accused of rape and murder of a minor in Bhilwara’s Kotri in August 2023 to death penalty is absolutely welcome,” he said.
‘During the incident, our government took immediate action against the accused and arrested them… The charge sheet of this case was also filed within a month. The culprits were sentenced within 10 months,” he wrote on his official X account.
