An Indian court has handed down a life sentence to a police volunteer convicted of the rape and murder of a junior doctor at the hospital where she worked in Kolkata, Al Jazeera reports.
Judge Anirban Das rejected demands for the death penalty for 33-year-old Sanjay Roy, stating that the case did not qualify as “the rarest of the rare cases,” and ordered he spend the remainder of his life behind bars.
Roy, who has consistently maintained his innocence and claims he was framed, has the option to appeal the judgment in a higher court.
The body of the 31-year-old trainee doctor, whose identity has been withheld to protect the family’s privacy in accordance with Indian law on sexual violence cases, was discovered in a classroom at the state-run R G Kar Medical College and Hospital on August 9. An autopsy revealed she had been strangled and sexually assaulted.
While federal police argued that the crime belonged to the “rarest-of-rare” category and called for the death penalty, a sentence also supported by the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) party, the judge disagreed.
Roy was apprehended the day after the crime, and legal proceedings commenced in November. The brutal attack sparked national outrage, prompting India’s Supreme Court to establish a national task force to propose measures to improve safety in government hospitals.
Following the assault, doctors and medical students across India staged protests and rallies demanding enhanced security measures in healthcare facilities. Thousands of women also took to the streets, advocating for a swifter justice system.
Although India imposes the death penalty, it is seldom enforced in practice. The last executions occurred in March 2020, when four men convicted of the horrific 2012 gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old woman in Delhi were executed.
The doctor’s murder drew comparisons to the 2012 incident and fueled demands from doctors at government hospitals for better security, highlighting the vulnerabilities faced by healthcare professionals.
Activists argue that despite new sentencing requirements, rape incidents have not been deterred, and the number of reported cases is actually rising. In 2022, police recorded 31,516 rape cases, a 20 percent increase from 2021, according to the National Crime Records Bureau.
