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IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI

+

DEATH SENTENCE REFERENCE NO.6/2013

STATE THROUGH REFERENCE

..... Petitioner

Through:

Mr. Dayan Krishnan, Special Public

Prosecutor with Mr. Madhav

Khurana, Ms. Swati Goswami and

Ms. Manvi Priya, Advocates.

versus

RAM SINGH & ORS.

..... Respondents

Through:

Mr. A.P. Singh, Advocate for Akshay

Kumar and Vinay Sharma.

Mr. M.L. Sharma, Advocate for

Mukesh and Pawan Kumar Gupta.

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CRL. APP. NO.1398/2013

PAWAN KUMAR GUPTA

..... Appellant

Through:

Mr. M.L. Sharma, Advocate.

versus

STATE

..... Respondent

Through:

Mr. Dayan Krishnan, Special Public

Prosecutor with Mr. Madhav

Khurana, Ms. Swati Goswami and

Ms. Manvi Priya, Advocates.

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CRL. APP. NO.1399/2013

MUKESH

..... Appellant

Through:

Mr. M.L. Sharma, Advocate.

versus

STATE

..... Respondent

Through:

Mr. Dayan Krishnan, Special Public

Prosecutor with Mr. Madhav

Khurana, Ms. Swati Goswami and

Ms. Manvi Priya, Advocates.

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VINAY SHARMA AND ANR.

..... Appellants

Through:

Mr. A.P. Singh, Advocate

versus

STATE

..... Respondent

Through:

Mr. Dayan Krishnan, Special Public

Prosecutor with Mr. Madhav

Khurana, Ms. Swati Goswami and

Ms. Manvi Priya, Advocates.

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Date of Decision : March 13, 2014

CORAM:

HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE REVA KHETRAPAL

HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE PRATIBHA RANI

J U D G M E N T

: REVA KHETRAPAL, J.

1.

In an epoch when sexual assaults and ravishments are the order

of day, when young men (and even old ones) revel in public

declaration of their promiscuous pursuits, when not only the streets

but schools, colleges and work-places are approached by the

vulnerable with trepidation and even the judge has to be sensitized to

gender issues, the rape of a young girl hardly out of her teens, would

have gone unnoticed as scores of other violations of infants, girls and

women, but for fact that a public outraged at the manner in which the

entrails of the ravished were culled out of her body, leaving her to die,

stripped of all human dignity, completely unattired, in the darkness of

a wintry night, on a thoroughfare, took to the streets in their quest for

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justice. This had the trigger effect of impelling the investigative

agencies into using such tools of investigation as had lain in their

tool-kit hitherto before practically unused, to nail the culprits. Did

they indeed manage to foist the guilt on the guilty is the subject

matter of the present death reference and appeals. But before delving

any further into this arena, it is deemed appropriate to delineate the

stark facts, as nearly as possible, in the order of their occurrence.

2.

The victims are the complainant/eye-witness (PW-1) and the

prosecutrix who has not lived to recount her story, though has

chronicled the same in the form of „dying declarations‟. The offenders

before the Court are the four convicts, namely Mukesh, Akshay @

Thakur, Pawan @ Kalu, and Vinay. Besides them is the fifth culprit,

Ram Singh, who allegedly snapped his own life chord, possibly on

account of the rigors and mortifications of trial and against whom the

proceedings have consequently abated. Lastly, there is a Juvenile in

Conflict with Law (JCL) whose case was dealt with before the

appropriate forum and need not detain us. Apart from these key

players, there is another player of some import who has thrown light

on the incident, he having suffered a robbery on the same ill-fated

bus on which the alleged offences were committed, at the hands of

the very same convicts, just a lit