According to the prosecution,Vishwajeet Masalkar had himself reported to the police that robbery had taken place in his house and during the course of the robbery, his wife, mother and child were also murdered. (Representational Image)Observing that the case deserves to be treated as ‘rarest of rare’, the Bombay High Court on Tuesday upheld the death sentence of a man convicted of the murder his mother, wife and daughter in Wanavadi area in October 2012. In August, 2016, the additional sessions court in Pune had sentenced Vishwajeet Masalkar, a facility executive in DTSS Company in the city, to death under IPC sections 302 (murder) and 307 (attempt to murder) in the case.
A division bench of Justices B P Dharmadhikari and Swapna S Joshi, said, “…aggravating circumstances explicit that it is the rarest of rare case and the accused has thus committed a diabolic and brutal murder of his wife, mother and child and being a heinous offence, it pricks the judicial conscience.”
“By finishing the family, the accused has tried to shatter the basic foundation of the society. In view thereof, in our considered view, sentencing the accused with imprisonment for life would not be a proper sentence for him”, it added.
The bench said, “…the victims were innocent, closely related to the accused depending upon him. So also having trust in him and they have been killed by the accused. The act of killing mother is of extreme ingratitude towards the source of life. So also the wife would always have trust in her husband and would expect care and security from him.”
It added, “In fact, there was no need to kill wife in such a brutal manner, particularly when the accused had option to take divorce from her. The accused has even not spared his two-year-old daughter for no fault of hers. Thus, killing of daughter, wife and mother in such a ruthless manner, cannot be justified.”
Masalkar’s mother, Shobha, wife Archana and daughter Kimaya were found murdered with severe injuries in their house on October 4, 2012. Their 75-year-old neighbour, Madhusudan Kulkarni, was critically injured in the attack.
Masalkar’s interrogation had revealed he had illicit relationship with a woman from Jejuri, and had eliminated his wife. Police said Masalkar first murdered Archana and then his two-year-old daughter Kimaya with a hammer. He then waited for his mother to return home in the afternoon on that day. When his mother entered the house, she locked herself in the bathroom after seeing what her son had done, but Masalkar broke open the door and killed her too.
According to the prosecution, Masalkar had himself reported to the police that robbery had taken place in his house and during the course of the robbery, his wife, mother and child were also murdered. He had also reported that one gold chain of 8 tolas, one gold mangalsutra, Rs 7,000 cash, three small gold rings and two almond-shape pendants had been stolen from the house.
Assistant public prosecutor Arfan Sait argued that spot panchanama showed that except for the gold chain, all the other articles were found in a purse hidden behind a photo frame, which clearly indicated that the accused had lodged a false complaint.
Advocates Yug Chaudhry and Payoshi Roy, appearing for Masalkar, had argued that the conviction was based only on the point of recovery of jewellery, which was not identified by any of the witnesses, including Archana’s father. They further argued that the prosecution has failed to establish the link between Shobha, Archana and the jewellery allegedly found from the Masalkar house.
The bench, however, observed, “The conduct of the accused and his act of killing Shobha, Archana and Kimaya clearly indicate that the accused is unfit to revert to the civilized society.”
