A special court in Madhya Pradesh has awarded death sentence to a 25-year-old man for raping and killing an elderly woman.
Special judge Naurin Nigam pronounced the sentence to the accused, Akhbar Khan, on Wednesday and termed the crime heinous.
Khan had raped the 75-year-old woman when she was alone at her home in Chhatarpur city on February 21, 2017.
When she tried to resist his move, he inflicted injuries to her private parts following which she died on February 28, Madhya Pradesh Director General, Prosecution, Rajendra Kumar, said.
The prosecution faced difficulty in proving the case as there was no eyewitness.
But the accused was nailed on the basis of scientific evidences, like samples collected from the woman's body which matched with the samples of the clothes worn by the accused while committing the crime.
"This is the first capital punishment awarded to a person in a rape and murder case in MP in 2019. The prosecution team in Chhatarpur did its job in a professional manner," he claimed.
The accused was held guilty under Indian Penal Code Sections 450 (house-trespass in order to commit an offence), 376 (rape) and 302 (murder). The court has also imposed on him a fine of Rs 5,000, district prosecution officer S K Chaturvedi said.
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