The Uber cab driver, who was held guilty of raping a woman passenger in his taxi and trying to strangulate her while committing the act last year, was sentenced to life in prison today.
The court also ordered compensation to be paid to the victim.
Additional Sessions Judge Kaveri Baweja, who convicted 32-year-old Shiv Kumar Yadav, heard arguments on quantum of sentence and pronounced the order today.
The prosecution had sought the maximum term allowed under the charges for Yadav while the defence counsel argued that the case did not fall under the ambit of ‘rarest of rare.’ The defence lawyer also argued that there was barely any physical violence involved in the act.
The court also ordered the Delhi Legal Service Authority to provide legal aid to Shiv Kumar Yadav’s family.
The court had on October 20 held Yadav guilty of offences under sections 376(2)(m) (while committing rape causes grievous bodily harm or disfigures or endangers life of a woman), 366 (abducting with an intent to compel her for marriage), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 323 (causing hurt) of the IPC.
The offence of endangering a woman’s life while raping her entails a minimum of 10 years of rigorous imprisonment and a maximum of a life term. In its 99-page judgement, the special fast track court, that was set up to deal with cases of sexual offences against women, has said that the victim was reminded of the horrific December 16, 2012 gangrape incident after the driver of the US-based service provider had threatened to insert an iron rod in her body.
The court has held that the threat perception was very real in the mind of the 25-year-old victim when the driver had intimated and threatened her, that too at an isolated spot in the late hours of December 5, 2014. According to the prosecution, the incident took place on the night of December 5 last year when the victim, a finance executive working in Gurgaon, was heading back to her house in Inderlok.
Accused driver Shiv Kumar Yadav was arrested on December 7, 2014 from Mathura and is currently in judicial custody. Special Public Prosecutor Atul Shrivastava, appointed for conducting proceedings in the case, has said he would demand maximum punishment of life imprisonment which under the relevant provision of the amended rape law means jail term till the convict’s remaining natural life.
(With inputs from PTI.)
Also read:
How the Uber Rape Case Unfolded, From Arrest to Conviction
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