Pehlu case: Two minors sent to juvenile home for 3 years in Alwar

JAIPUR/ALWAR: The Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) in Alwar on Friday sentenced the two minors accused a week ago in the case related to the mob-lynching of Pehlu Khan in 2017 to three years’ detention each at a juvenile correctional facility. This is the first sentencing in the case that created a flutter across the country.
The minors have been sentenced on the basis of photographic and video evidence collected during investigations.
A total of nine people, including the two minors, had been accused for lynching the dairy farmer with six being acquitted by a trial court later. A seventh person had claimed to be a minor, but the JJB found him to be an adult. His trial is going on at a Behror court.
The JJB also rejected the minors’ application to suspend the sentence. Defence lawyer Adarsh Kumar Yadav told TOI, “The Board had the power to suspend the sentence, but it rejected the application. We do not agree with the verdict and will appeal against it in the coming week.”
Pehlu Khan (55), a dairy farmer from Haryana’s Nuh district, his two sons and some others were intercepted and attacked by cow vigilantes near Behror on April 1, 2017.
Pehlu succumbed to his injuries three days later at a private hospital in Alwar. Seven cases had been registered in the matter, including one against Pehlu and his sons for transporting cattle and against the mob for lynching him.
The families of the accused minors expressed their unhappiness over the decision. “Six of the accused have been acquitted, but my son, who was going to give a practical exam and was not part or present at the time of lynching, has been convicted. He was unnecessarily made part of the case,” said the parent of one.
A chargesheet against five of the accused was submitted before the trial court on May 31, 2017, and another against one more person in January 2019. A third chargesheet, which named Pehlu and his two sons, was filed in May, 2019. But the deceased’s name was dropped from it later.
On August 14, 2019, a trial court in Alwar had acquitted the six accused in the lynching case. The trial court had given the benefit of doubt to the accused, citing a botched investigation by the Alwar police and saying the prosecution had failed to furnish key documents in the court to prove the charges.
The acquittal had created a hue and cry following which the Haryana government formed a SIT to identify lapses in the investigation and fix the responsibility on individual officers who had conducted the probe. The SIT found many serious lapses in investigation.
Petitions were filed in the Rajasthan High Court, one by Pehlu’s family and another by the state government, against the acquittal of the accused in October 2019. In the same month, the HC ordered the quashing of the FIR and chargesheet filed against Pehlu, his two sons and the vehicle driver on the grounds of abuse of law.