Kota: A Jhalawar court Wednesday sentenced a suspended cop, the wife of a murdered Intelligence Bureau officer and others to varied terms of imprisonment in the case.
While the suspended Rajasthan Police official was sentenced to life-term imprisonment and slapped with a Rs 1 lakh fine, the wife of the IB officer and another convict were awarded 14 years’ rigorous imprisonment.
Another accused was acquitted for want of evidence.
Notably, the mortal remains of Chetan Prakash Galav, posted as a senior technical officer in IB, New Delhi, was found at a railway station in Ralayta in Jhalawar in February 2018.
The police initially lodged a case under Section 174 (police to enquire and report on suicide, etc.) of CrPC, however, following a court order the plea of the officer’s father who suspected murder, the police investigated the case and held it be a case of murder.
The police claimed the officer’s wife Anita Meena, a government school teacher, her lover Praveen Rathore, the suspended cop, conspired with Sharukh Khan, an RTO agent, who was hired for Rs 3 lakh.
The trio along with Santosh Nirmal, a private medical nurse and another accused Farhan aside from a minor boy, hatched a plan to kill Galav.
The court held Rathore (35) and Khan guilty of conspiracy, kidnap and murder under IPC and SC/ST Act and awarded them life terms with a fine of Rs 1 lakh each, public prosecutor Dipesh Bhardwaj Thursday said.
Meena and Nirmal, on the other hand, were held guilty of conspiracy and murder and sentenced to 14 years in jail.
While Farhan was acquitted, the minor faces trial in a juvenile court.
The mystery behind Galav’s murder began to unravel with the arrest of Khan four months after the murder. He had allegedly abducted Galav with the help of two neighbours from the Jhalawar railway station and injected him with a double dose of Ketamine to kill him. The injections were supplied by Nirmal.
The arrest of Meena further revealed to the police startling facts, including it was the accused’s fifth attempt on Galav.
PTI
