INDIA: HIGH COURT COMMUTES DEATH SENTENCE TO LIFE TERM

April 14, 2015: Gujarat high court has commuted the death sentence of a convict to life imprisonment in a case of kidnapping and murder of a 9-year-old in Navsari.
Parvez Rana (38) was awarded death penalty in 2012 by a trial court in Navsari district for murdering the boy for a ransom of Rs 50 lakh. The murder took place in 2007.
Rana told police that he had kidnapped Nayan to make some quick money. He told the police that he had kept Nayan in a plastic bag and left it at his shop. He kept a watch on police movement from his shop and fearing arrest decided to kill the child. He strangled the child and threw the body in a rivulet.
Rana had challenged the death penalty in the high court. The bench of Justice Akil Kureshi and Justice V M Pancholi concluded that the case did not fall under the rarest of the rare category and reduced the punishment to life imprisonment, said Rana's lawyer Pratik Barot. (Sources: TNN, 14/04/2015)