Supreme Court hands out life term to RJD leader & ex-MP in double murder case

The Supreme Court on Friday sentenced Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader and former Member of Parliament (MP) Prabhunath Singh to life imprisonment in a double murder case of 1995, days after it reversed his acquittal which it said was a result of the failure of the state machinery and trial court to ensure a fair trial.

A bench of justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, AS Oka, and Vikram Nath also directed Singh and the Bihar government to pay ₹10 lakh each and separately to the families of the two deceased victims and ₹5 lakh each to an injured victim in the case.

Singh was produced virtually from the Hazaribagh jail in Jharkhand where he is presently undergoing life imprisonment in another murder case.

A trial court in 2017 had found him guilty in connection with the 1995 murder of legislator Ashok Singh, who defeated the former MP in the 1995 Bihar assembly poll. Prabhunath Singh had threatened to eliminate him within 90 days of the election results.

Senior advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi and R Basanth, representing Singh pleaded that his client be not sentenced to death sentence since it was not a case that would fall within the category of the “rarest of rare” offence. 

The lawyers added Singh’s acquittals by two courts below have been reversed by the Supreme Court, and it is also a relevant factor to be accounted for at the time of sentencing. While the lawyers informed the bench that Singh has also filed a review petition against the conviction order on August 18.