T P Chandrasekharan murder case: Kerala HC upholds conviction order by trial court
Kochi (PTI): The Kerala High Court on Monday upheld the conviction of the accused in the T P Chandrasekharan murder case of 2012.
It also dismissed the appeal of the convicts challenging the trial court order sentencing them.
A Division Bench of Justices A K Jayasankaran Nambiar and Kauser Edappagath set aside the acquittal of two accused and convicted them for criminal conspiracy in the case related to the murder of Revolutionary Marxist Party (RMP) leader Chandrasekharan at Onchiyam on May 4, 2012.
The High Court confirmed the judgment of the trial court and upheld the conviction of Anoop, Manoj alias Kirmani Manoj, N K Sunil Kumar alias Kodi Suni, T K Rajeesh, K K Muhammed Shafi, S Sijith, K Shinoj, K C Ramachandran, Manojan and Kunhanandan in respect of the charges proved against them.
The court also noted that Kunhanandan had expired during the pendency of these appeals.
The court was considering multiple appeals filed by the convicts seeking to set aside their conviction and sentencing. It also heard the state's appeal to enhance the sentencing of the accused. There was another appeal filed by K K Rema, widow of Chandrasekharan, seeking to convict an accused, who had been acquitted.
"We set aside the acquittal of A10 (K K Krishnan) and A12 (Geothi Babu) and convict them under Section 120 B read with 302 of the IPC. We confirm the acquittal of the other accused," the court said in its order.
The trial court at Kozhikode had acquitted 24 accused, including CPI(M) District Secretary P Mohanan in the case.
The High Court on Monday directed the jail authorities to produce all the convicted before it on February 26 to hear the state government's plea to enhance their sentencing.
The court also ordered to produce before it the two accused who were convicted today.
The accused in their appeal alleged that the investigation team acted in a premeditated manner and created false evidence.
The Kozhikode Additional Sessions Court had in 2014 sentenced 11 accused to life imprisonment and awarded three years' jail term to another accused, Lambu Pradeep.
The convicted included CPI(M) local leaders K C Ramachandran and the late Kunhanandan.
Chandrasekharan (52) was hacked to death by a gang while he was returning home on his bike.
The then United Democratic Front (UDF) government in Kerala constituted a special investigation team to probe the case.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
