Kolkata, Dec 23 The Jangipur Sub-Divisional court in Murshidabad district of West Bengal, on Tuesday, sentenced 13 individuals convicted for the murder of Hargobindo Das and his son Chandan Das in April during protests against the Waqf (Amendment) Act.
The Sub-Divisional Court Judge Amitabha Mukhopadhyay had convicted 13 individuals on Monday.
The quantum of punishment was pronounced on Tuesday, with the entire court premises wrapped in a thick security blanket.
The deceased father and son were residents of Jafrabad village under the Samserganj Police Station in Jangipur Police District in Murshidabad district.
The 13 convicts who were sentenced to life imprisonment were Dildar Nadab, Asmaul Nadab, Inzamul Haque, Ziaul Haque, Fekharul Sheikh, Aazfarul Sheikh, Munirul Sheikh, Iqbal Sheikh, Nurul Sheikh, Saba Karim, Hazrat Sheikh, Akbar Ali and Yusuf Sheikh.
On Monday, while convicting the 13 individuals in the case, the judge observed that the reasons for the murders were not prompted by any political motive but out of personal vendetta.
The BJP had claimed that the observation of the judge had "exposed that the murders were attempts to mislead the public and deflect responsibility" in the name of opposing the Waqf (Amendment) Act.
The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the state police had arrested the 13 persons one after another.
Earlier this year, the SIT submitted a 900-page charge sheet in the matter.
In the charge sheet, it was mentioned that the father and the son were killed while they tried to prevent riots within the village.
The SIT also described the attack as "pre-planned".
The family members of the deceased father and the son rejected the compensation offer from the Trinamool Congress-led state government. However, they accepted the compensation offered to them by the Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari.
In April this year, the Calcutta High Court, while directing the formation of the SIT to investigate the Murshidabad riots, also ordered the deployment of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) in the area.
A division bench of Justice Soumen Sen and Justice Raja Basu Chowdhury also observed that the measures taken by the West Bengal government to control communal unrest were inadequate, and that if the CAPF been deployed earlier, the situation would not have been so "grave" and "volatile".
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