Video Producer: Mayank Chawla
Video Editor: Mohd Irshad Alam
“It’s a relief that the accused will be behind bars,” 74-year-old Madhavi Vishwanathan told The Quint on 18 October, hours after a Delhi court convicted five men in the 15-year-old murder case of her daughter and journalist Soumya Vishwanathan.
Soumya, then working with the news channel India Today, was returning to her south Delhi home in the wee hours on 30 September 2008, when she was shot dead.
Over 15 years later, the Saket court held the five accused – Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, Baljeet Malik, Ajay Kumar and Ajay Sethi – guilty under relevant sections of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999 (MCOCA).
While four of the accused have also been charged under Section 302 (murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the fifth accused has been convicted under Section 411 (dishonestly receiving stolen property), LiveLaw reported. The court has not yet announced the quantum of the sentence.
“I hope the court gives them a life sentence,” Madhavi told The Quint.
‘Delhi Roads Will Be Safe At Least From One Gang’
While pronouncing the verdict, Additional Sessions Judge Ravindra Kumar Pandey of Saket Court on 18 October observed that the prosecution had proved its case beyond any reasonable doubt. According to the police, the motive behind the murder was robbery.
Soumya was found dead in her car on South Delhi’s Nelson Mandela Marg on 30 September 2008. The first breakthrough in the investigation emerged six months after the incident, with the murder investigation of a BPO employee Jigisha Ghosh, when one of the accused confessed to killing Soumya.
The accused have been in custody since March 2009. But it was a long road to justice.
On the court’s verdict today, Madhavi said, “I cannot say that roads in Delhi will be safe. But at least they will be safe from one gang.”
She added that the verdict will prove to be a “deterrent” for criminals and that it sends the “right message.”
In 2009, the Delhi Police had invoked MCOCA against the Ravi Kumar and others, and submitted the chargesheet to the court. The case has dragged on for 15 years even as the prosecution took 13 years to present evidence. The prosecution started presenting the evidence in the case on 23 April 2010 and concluded on 17 May 2023, as reported in The Times of India.
‘Last 15 Years Very Traumatic, Life Paralysed’
On being asked what led to the delay in the proceedings of the case, Madhavi said, “The changes in the judges, the changes in the public prosecutor may have added to it.”
In October 2014, the public prosecutor in the case Rajiv Mohan quit to pursue his private legal practice. At that time, Soumya’s parents had approached Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and sought the appointment of a special prosecutor.
Meanwhile, Madhavi, who has attended almost every court proceeding in Delhi in the last 15 years said that it has been traumatic for her family but they had no other option.
“It has been very traumatic. We are also ageing, and all this has taken a toll on us. But we had to be in court to see what was happening. We couldn’t have avoided it,” the 74-year-old said.
“We’ve never been scared. Fear comes when you have interest; we don’t have any interest in our lives anymore. Our life has been paralysed. There was nothing else for us to look forward to but fight for justice. We had to do it. Otherwise, how will we ever face her when we go,” she said, on how her family never lost hope for justice.
Also Read: Will my Friend Soumya Vishwanathan Fade into Oblivion?
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)