The Gujarat High Court on Friday, 27 December upheld capital punishment for a 22-year-old man convicted for rape and murder of a three-year-old girl in Surat in October 2018.
A division bench of Justices Bela Trivedi and AC Rao rejected the appeal filed by Anil Yadav against the death penalty awarded by a special Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act court in Surat in July.
The state government had sought confirmation of the sentence.
The victim went missing from her house in Godadara area of Surat on 14 October 2018.
Police found her body a day later from a locked room on the ground floor of the building where she lived.
Yadav, who occupied that room, was missing.
A migrant labourer from Bihar, he knew the victim and her family.
He was arrested from his village in Buxar district of Bihar five days after the body was discovered, and charged with raping and murdering the girl.
(This is a developing story and the copy will be updated.)
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