INDIA: MAN GETS DEATH PENALTY FOR HONOUR KILLING

March 23, 2022:

A court in Ahmedabad on 15 March 2022 punished one Hardik Chavda (27) with death for killing his pregnant sister and brother-in-law in a case of honour killing in Sanand town in September 2018.
Additional sessions judge J A Thakkar considered Chavda’s act of murdering the couple and their child in mother’s womb as the rarest of rare case and awarded death sentence to him with observation, “This act cannot be taken lightly and if treated lightly, it will be an injustice for women in the society and the old mentality of our society will get an encouragement, the instances of domination over women and incidents of honour killings will be encouraged. Women will continue to suffer humiliation and this will cause damage to our social system.”
The incident happened in Sanand (Gujarat), where Taruna (21) and Vishal Parmar (22) had shifted after their marriage few months ago. Taruna’s family was dead against this union and her brother, Hardik Chavda, bore a grudge. A resident of Kointiya village of Detroj taluka in Ahmedabad district, Chavda had threatened the couple few days before he committed the murders. On 26 September 2018, Chavda attacked the couple at their house in Sanand. Taruna, who was pregnant then, received eight stab wounds. After killing his sister, Chavda chased his brother-in-law to a neighbour’s house and in front of the neighbour, Rambhaben Rathod, and her two children, he inflicted 17 knife blows on Parmar.
During the trial, assistant public prosecutor A M Gulabani examined 17 witnesses and placed 63 documents as evidence to establish Chavda’s guilt. The court punished Chavda with death for murder under section 302 of IPC and awarded 10-year-imprisonment under section 316 of IPC, “for causing quick death of unborn child”.
The court has recommended the District Legal Service Authority, Ahmedabad (Rural) to pay compensation of Rs 10 lakh to Parmar’s parents, who according to the court lost three members of the family in their son, daughter-in-law and their unborn child.
The court has imposed a fine of Rs 61,000 on Chavda and ordered to pay Rs 50,000 compensation to witness, Rathod, who is also considered a victim of this crime since one murder took place in her house in front of her and her children.