Mother’s Anguish: SC Takes Notice of ‘No Reason’ Shooting Case

The Highest Tribunal on Monday issued notification of a plea lodged by the progenitor of TV correspondent Soumya Viswanathan, contesting the liberty accorded to four males serving existence incarceration for the homicide of her offspring in 2008.

A seating of magistrates Bela M Trivedi and Pankaj Mithal sought feedback from the four wrongdoers and the Delhi administration within a span of four weeks.

At first, the bench was disinclined to issue notification in the affair; nevertheless, the attorney for the petitioner insisted that the matter necessitates the focus of the apex court. “I am an aggrieved progenitor of the defunct”, stated the attorney for Soumya’s progenitor. She emphasized that her client’s offspring was homeward bound from labor and without cause she was shot and “she was blameless…”. She underscored that the implicated are part of an illegal coalition. “Let notification be dispatched, to be accounted for after four weeks’”, declared the bench.

Madhavi Viswanathan, the progenitor of TV correspondent Soumya Viswanathan, approached the Supreme Tribunal disputing the liberty granted to four convicts, serving existence incarceration for her offspring’s homicide in 2008. Vishwanathan was killed by gunfire in the early hours of September 30, 2008, on Nelson Mandela Boulevard in southern Delhi. She was homeward bound from labor in her vehicle. The Delhi Supreme Tribunal on February 12, granting bail to the accused, had observed that the convicts have been in custody for 14 years.

The supreme tribunal revoked the terms of incarceration of Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, Baljeet Singh Malik, and Ajay Kumar and accorded them bail until the endurance of their appeals disputing their conviction and sentence.

In November 2023, a special tribunal had meted out two terms of existence to the four accused who were arraigned for homicide and also under Section 3(1)(i) (executing organized crime leading to the demise of any individual) of the Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA). The tribunal had clearly delineated that the terms of incarceration will progress “sequentially”. The fifth convict, Ajay Sethi, was meted out three years of unadorned incarceration under section 411 (dishonestly receiving stolen property) of the IPC.