Arunachal Pradesh man gets life imprisonment for killing wife in 2018

Itanagar: An Arunachal Pradesh district court has sentenced a man to life imprisonment for the murder of his wife in 2018 over suspicion that she was in an extramarital relationship.

In his December 17 verdict, sessions judge Dr Hirendra Kashyap sentenced Karsang Tania to rigorous life imprisonment following his conviction for the murder. The ruling was made available on Saturday.

According to the order, the judge convicted Tania on November 13, finding him guilty of killing his wife on the night of March 31, 2018. The couple, married since 2003, were living in Sanglo Putung, Itanagar, with their minor son.

According to the prosecution, a heated argument broke out between the couple and at one point, Tania picked up an axe and hit his wife on the head. He later dumped the body at some distance from the house along a stream.

The body was spotted by some people living in the vicinity after some neighbours reported a foul smell in the area.

The verdict said the medical evidence placed before the court had confirmed that the death was homicidal, caused by fractures to the skull due to blunt-force trauma.

When Tania was questioned, he eventually confessed to the crime during interrogation by the police. They also got him to repeat the confession before a judge.

In arriving at the guilty verdict, the court also relied on the judicial confession recorded under Section 164 of the CrPC, which it found to be voluntary and corroborated by medical and circumstantial evidence.

Rejecting the defence plea of private defence, the court observed that the nature of injuries, the accused’s conduct after the incident, including burying the body, misleading family members by claiming the victim was missing, and absconding to forest areas and prayer centres, clearly pointed to criminal intent.

The court took into account the absence of any prior criminal antecedents and the circumstances of the crime to decline the prosecution’s push for the death sentence.