New Delhi, Aug 23 (PTI) A court in Delhi has sentenced a doctor to rigorous imprisonment of 12 years for throwing acid on a woman in 2014, saying the survivor, like the mythological bird Phoenix, rose from the ashes and rebuilt her life by fighting against the physical, mental and emotional trauma caused by the horrific incident.
Additional Sessions Judge Saumya Chauhan was hearing the arguments on sentencing against the convicts, Dr Ashok Yadav (42) and Vaibhav (32) who had been convicted of hatching a criminal conspiracy to throw acid on the woman’s face.
Additional Public Prosecutor Nimmi Sisodia said the convicts did not deserve any leniency for the heinous offence committed on December 23, 2014.
In an order dated July 26, made available recently, the court said, “The convict Ashok Yadav is the mastermind of the whole conspiracy. When the victim refused his repeated proposals for marriage, and her marriage was fixed elsewhere, the convict decided to take revenge on her by disfiguring her face.” It said that Yadav then contacted co-accused Vaibhav and hatched the plan to throw acid on the woman, and to avoid suspicion, Yadav decided to give it the colour of robbery, by robbing the woman’s bag.
The court said, “It is unfortunate that even a degree in MBBS could not uproot the deeply embedded patriarchal mindset and medieval thinking of the convict. So blinded he was by the motive of revenge that he abandoned the sacred oath taken by the medical professionals, i.e, to observe beneficence, non-maleficence, and confidentiality; and went ahead with hatching the conspiracy to destroy an innocent life.” Rejecting the defence argument that since the acid was thrown from a syringe, there was no intention to kill the victim or cause disfiguration, the court said it could not lose sight of the fact that the acid was thrown on the survivor’s face and eye of the victim, and that her right eye had been damaged beyond repair.
The court then trashed another defence argument that the survivor was now living a normal and comfortable life, that she was happily married and working as a doctor.
“It appears that the convict intended the victim to lead a miserable life after the acid attack. However, the victim, like the mythological bird Phoenix, rose from the ashes and rebuilt her life by fighting against the physical, mental and emotional trauma caused to her by this horrific incident.
The cruelty of the act of the convict is not mitigated by the fact that the victim has emerged victorious even after the ordeal faced by her. He cannot be given the benefit of the courage and resilience shown by the victim,” the court said.
It said that an aggravating factor in this case was the manner in which the convict shattered the survivor’s trust.
It said, “The victim trusted the convict Ashok so much that he was the first person she called for help after the incident. However, the convict, while pretending to be her friend, clandestinely planned to disfigure her by throwing acid on her face.” The court sentenced Yadav to 12 years of rigorous imprisonment (RI) under IPC Sections 326 A (voluntarily causing grievous hurt by use of acid, etc.) read with 120 B (criminal conspiracy), along with a Rs five lakh fine, which was payable to the woman.
It released convict Vaibhav after noting that he had undergone substantive imprisonment of over 10 years since December 25, 2014. PTI MNR NB
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