Mumbai, May 17 (PTI) A court in Maharashtra’s Raigad district on Saturday sentenced three persons to double life imprisonment for killing former state child rights commission chairperson Meenakshi Jaiswal in December 2014.
Additional Sessions Judge (Panvel Court) SS Shinde convicted the trio – the victim’s driver Vinayak Chavan and his accomplices Manindarsingh Bajwa and Suraj Jaiswal – for murder and robbery under the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
Jaiswal, the former chairperson of the Maharashtra State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, whose husband was a judge at Malegaon then, was targeted at her home in Navi Mumbai.
Special Public Prosecutor Ujwal Nikam, who appeared for the state, said this case was based on circumstantial evidence.
The prosecution examined 20 witnesses connecting the chain of circumstances to prove the guilt of the accused persons, he said.
They have now been convicted by the additional sessions judge and handed double life imprisonment for offences under IPC sections 302 (murder) and 392 (robbery), Nikam added.
According to the police, Meenakshi Jaiswal was found in a pool of blood, her throat slit and fingers severed, by their family doctor at her apartment in Kharghar on the outskirts of Mumbai.
The murder was discovered after calls from her husband went unanswered. He asked their doctor to visit their flat and check on his wife.
The prosecution said that the murder was the outcome of a robbery plan gone wrong.