Ashutosh Kumar. – A ten year old girl was raped and murdered in the month of May, 2015. Two persons were charged for the offences under Section 302 and 376 of the Indian Penal Code (in short the I.P.C.) and Section 4 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (in the POCSO Act, 2012) , one being the appellant/Munna Pandey before this Court and the other, viz., Pritam Tiwary, who was declared a juvenile by the Juvenile Justice Board.

2. The Trial Court, after having examined six (6) witnesses on behalf of the prosecution, convicted the sole appellant under Sections 302 and 376 of the I.P.C. and Section 4 of the POCSO Act, 2012 vide judgment dated 02.02.2017 in Sessions Trial No. 581 of 2015, arising out of Sabour P.S. Case No. 106 of 2015 dated 01.06.2015, and by order dated 23.02.2017, the appellant was sentenced to death with a fine of Rs. 10,000/- for the offence under Section 302 of the I.P.C. and to undergo R.I. for ten years for the offence under Section 376 of the I.P.C. No sentence was awarded to him for the offence under Section 4 of the POCSO Act, 2012.

3. The appellant preferred an appeal before this Court vide Cr. Appeal (DB) No. 358 of 2017. Since the se