Unnao Case: Delhi Court Sentences Expelled BJP MLA Kuldeep Sengar to 10 Years in Prison

A Delhi court on Friday sentenced expelled BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar to 10 years’ imprisonment in the murder case of Unnao rape victim’s father.

District Judge Dharmesh Sharma directed both Kuldeep Singh Sengar and his brother Atul Sengar to pay Rs 10 lakh each as compensation to the victim’s family. The victim’s father had died in judicial custody on April 9, 2018. The woman was allegedly kidnapped and raped by Sengar in 2017 when she was a minor.

Last week, the Tis Hazari court had held Sengar and six other guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder, reported Live Law. The father was allegedly also framed in an illegal arms case and arrested on April 3, shortly after which he had succumbed to injuries.

Sengar is currently serving life sentence in Tihar jail after he was convicted in the rape case on December 16. He was charged under Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code and Sections 5(c) and 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. The court, while delivering the judgement, had announced that the victim’s testimony was “truthful and unblemished” against a “powerful person”.

The trial in the case was fast-tracked after it was transferred to Delhi from Uttar Pradesh on the instruction of the Supreme Court.

Sengar is also facing another trial for alleged criminal conspiracy behind the road crash which resulted in the killing of two aunts of the rape survivor and injuring the victim and the lawyer.

Sengar was arrested in 2018 following the accusation of rape, but the senior BJP leaders kept their silence for a long time—owing to his vote share and “popularity”. They also did not remove him from the party until August 2019.