2013 Kamduni Gangrape Case: Six Held Guilty, Sentencing Today

The sentence in the 2013 Kamduni gang rape and murder will be delivered by the sessions court today.

A sessions court in Kolkata held six out of eight guilty in the gangrape and murder of a 20-year-old girl in 2013. The victim was gangraped and brutally murdered while returning home from college at Kamduni village in West Bengal’s North 24 Parganas district. The sessions court will deliver the sentence on Friday.

Gangrape & Murder: How it Happened

• On 7 June 2013, a 20-year-old medical student was gangraped and murdered in Kamduni village in the Barasat sub-division of North 24 Parganas in West Bengal.
• The girl was abducted by nine men while she was returning from college.
• She was taken into an isolated place, gangraped and brutally killed.
• Her body was recovered from a field the next day.
• The girl belonged to a poor family. Her father works as a construction labourer.

Angry Protests by Villagers and Students

• Angry villagers launched a protest soon after the girl’s body was recovered.
  
• WB civil supplies minister Jyotipriya Mallick and Bashirhat MP Haji Nurul Islam faced the protestors’ wrath when they visited the village.
  
• TMC district president Nirmal Ghosh’s car was damaged.
  
• The protest spread to Kolkata, with various women groups and activists joining in.
  
• Filmmaker Aparna Sen, poet Shankha Ghosh, actor Soumitra Chatterjee and many other civil society members had joined the protests in Kolkata.
  
• The protest continued for over a month.
  
• 13 July 2015: Family members and villagers had met President Pranab Mukherjee.
  

Who the Accused Are

• The first arrest was made on 8 June 2013. The accused Ansar Ali was nabbed by the villagers and handed over to the police.
  
• Eight people are facing trial. One of the accused, Gopal Naskar, died in custody during trial.
  
• Saiful Ali, Ansar Ali, Sk Emamul Islam, Aminur Islam, Bhola Naskar, Amin Ali, Noor Ali and Rafiqul Islam Gazi are facing trial.
  

The Case So Far

• West Bengal government ordered a CID probe following the public outrage.
  
• The first chargesheet was filed on 18 June 2013.
  
• 31 witnesses deposed during trial.
  
• 10 September 2013: The trial court framed charges. All accused have been booked under IPC sections 376-D (Gang-rape), 302 (Murder), 201 (Causing disappearance of evidence of offence) and 120B (Criminal conspiracy).
  
• 22 December 2015: Trial came to end.
• 28 January 2016: Six out of eight accused found guilty.
  
• 29 January 2016: Quantum of punishment to be decided.