The Allahabad High Court has revised the sentence for the convict in a horrific case involving the rape and murder of a 3-year-old child. Instead of the death penalty originally given, the court has now decided on a 30-year prison term with no chance of early release.

Considering the convict's age of 25 at the time of the crime and his marital status with a child, Justices Ashwani Kumar Mishra and Syed Aftab Husain Rizvi, on the bench, factored these circumstances into their decision.

"There is neither any criminal history to the credit of the appellant-accused nor is he a previous convict, so the chances of his reformation cannot be ruled out. These are the mitigating circumstances," the division bench said. 

The Court referred to a recent judgment of the Supreme Court in Kashi Nath Singh, alias Kallu Singh, v. State of Jharkhand (2023), where a 14-year-old girl was brutally subjected to rape and murder and the death penalty was imposed by the trial court, which was commuted to a sentence of life imprisonment for the whole of biological life without any benefit of remission by the High Court.

However, the Supreme Court modified this decision, changing the life imprisonment sentence to a fixed term of 30 years without any possibility of remission. This modification took into account the appellant's age of 26 at the time of the crime and the potential for his reformation. In the present case, the High Court was reviewing a capital criminal appeal against the judgment and order issued by the Special Judge (POCSO Act). The case involved charges under Sections 364, 302, 376AB, 377, and 201 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), and Section 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses Act (POCSO Act).

Dinesh Paswan, the appellant, was found guilty and condemned to death for violating Section 6 of The Protection of Children From Sexual Offenses Act, 2012, and Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code, among other charges with default penalties. The prosecution alleged that during an idol immersion event, Dinesh Paswan lured the three-year-old daughter of the informant to his room, where he sexually assaulted and murdered her in a brutal manner. Subsequently, he concealed her deceased body.

During the trial, the prosecution presented 17 witnesses who provided oral evidence and substantiated 26 prosecution documents along with 42 material exhibits. In contrast, the defense did not produce any oral or documentary evidence. Consequently, the trial court, after considering the arguments from both sides, found the appellant-accused guilty and sentenced him to death.

The high court also affirmed that the evidence presented by the prosecution established several critical points: the accused had nefarious intentions in enticing the victim to his room; the victim's lifeless body was discovered in the accused's room, which he had bolted from the inside; upon forcibly entering the room, the accused was found present; the postmortem report confirmed the victim had suffered a brutal sexual assault, and forensic examination conclusively linked the accused to the crime through DNA analysis, matching his DNA profile with that retrieved from anal swabs collected during the victim's postmortem examination.

Therefore, the high court determined that there were no irregularities or irrationalities in the trial court's verdict of guilt. It acknowledged that the trial court had thoroughly examined all aggravating and mitigating factors, providing a detailed and reasoned judgment to establish that the case belonged to the category of "rarest of the rare" instances. However, the division bench emphasized that the court must deliberate on the appropriate punishment after taking into account all aggravating and mitigating elements, as well as the context in which the crime transpired.

Therefore, while stating that the convict's young age and his family were the mitigating factors, it decided to commute the sentence awarded to him.

 Case Title: Dinesh Paswan v State of UP