Chandigarh, March 18: In a significant development nearly seven years after the brutal crime that shocked the nation’s conscience, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has dismissed the suspension of sentence plea filed by Sanji Ram, the convicted mastermind of the 2018 Kathua rape and murder case. The Division Bench of Justices Gurvinder Singh Gill and Ramesh Kumari, in an order passed on March 6, firmly stated that Ram, the former caretaker of the temple where the horrific crime unfolded, is not entitled to the “concession of suspension of sentence at this stage.”
Sanji Ram was sentenced to life imprisonment by a Pathankot sessions court in 2019 for his pivotal role in the kidnapping, wrongful confinement, and brutal murder of an eight-year-old nomadic girl. The crime, which took place in January 2018, involved the girl being sedated and held captive in the Rasana temple near Kathua in Jammu for several days before she was bludgeoned to death. The case, initially marred by procedural lapses, was transferred to the J&K Crime Branch and later shifted to Pathankot in Punjab by the Supreme Court to ensure a fair trial, free from local pressures.
During the hearing, Sanji Ram’s counsel, Senior Advocate Vinod Ghai, argued for the suspension of his life sentence on two primary grounds. First, he contended that despite the prosecution examining 114 witnesses, no concrete evidence directly linking his client to the crime was presented. Second, he highlighted that Ram has already served a substantial period of over eight years in custody.
However, these arguments were strongly contested by the prosecution and the victim’s family. Senior Advocate R.S. Cheema, representing the State of Jammu and Kashmir, and advocates Mandeep Singh Basra and Anupinder Brar, appearing for the victim’s family, vehemently opposed the bail plea. Cheema underscored the heinous nature of the crime and argued that the testimonies of witnesses and the circumstantial evidence on record “clearly evident” the complicity of the accused. He further reminded the court that with the trial court having already recorded a conviction, the presumption of innocence no longer favored the applicant.
Agreeing with the prosecution, the High Court bench, while refraining from commenting on the merits of the case, observed the gravity of the offense and dismissed the application. The court did, however, acknowledge that Ram has spent considerable time in custody and directed its registry to list his main appeal against the conviction for final hearing in September of this year.
The original trial judge, in his 2019 judgment, had described the crime as “devilish and monstrous,” carried out in the most “shameful, inhumane and barbaric manner.” The judge had famously invoked a couplet by Mirza Ghalib to illustrate the vulnerability of the young victim: “Pinha tha daam-e-sakht qareeb ashiyaan ke, udhne hi nahi paye the ki girftar hum hue” (The hunters had laid a deadly trap near the nest, and the fledgling was caught before it could even take its first flight).
Alongside Sanji Ram, his nephew Parvesh Kumar and special police officer Deepak Khajuria were also sentenced to life imprisonment. Three other policemen received five-year sentences for their role in a subsequent cover-up and destruction of evidence, while Sanji Ram’s son, Vishal, was acquitted.