Chandigarh, Mar 11 (ANI): The Punjab and Haryana High Court has commuted death sentence of four convicts to life imprisonment including the prime conspirator, Ganga Raj, in the Manoj-Babli double murder case.
In a blow to the Taliban-style caste panchayats of Haryana, a sessions court in Karnal had on March 31 last year sentenced five people to hang until death for killing a couple from the same village and gotra.
The leader of Banawala khap, Ganga Raj, was awarded life sentence for hatching a conspiracy to kill a couple just because they had married against the wishes of elders who had termed them 'brother and sister'.
Five of Babli's family members-her brother Suresh, uncles Rajender and Baru Ram and cousins Satish and Gurdev-were ordered to hang until death for killing the couple on June 15, 2007. The judge sentenced the seventh accused, Mandeep Singh, driver of the Scorpio used in the crime, to seven years' jail for kidnapping and conspiracy.
Manoj, 23, of Karoran village in Kaithal district, had married Babli, 19, against the wishes of her family on April 7, 2007.
The Manoj-Babli honour killing case was the honour killing of newly-weds Manoj Banwala and Babli in June 2007 and the successive court case, which historically convicted defendants for an honor killing. The killing was ordered by a Khap panchayat (Khap), a religious caste-based council among Jats, in their Karora village in Kaithal district, Haryana. (ANI)
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