A special court in Lucknow, on Friday, sentenced Gayatri Prajapati, former Uttar Pradesh minister and two others life imprisonment in the Chitrakoot gang-rape case. The two other are – Ashish Shukla, a former revenue clerk in Amethi and Ashok Tewari, a contractor. The court has also imposed a penalty of Rs 2 lakh on each of the convicted persons.
Prajapati and two others were found guilty of gang-raping the mother and trying to rape her little daughter by Special Judge PK Rai, who stated that the prosecution had proven the accusations against the trio beyond a reasonable doubt. While convicting the trio, the court acquitted four other defendants in the case – Vikas Verma, Roopeshwar aka Rupesh, Amrendra Singh alias Pintu, and Chandrapal – owing to a lack of evidence.
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The prosecution has held around 17 witnesses in the case.
So, what was the matter?
On February 18, 2017, a lady from Chitrakoot in Uttar Pradesh filed an FIR against Prajapati and his six colleagues for allegedly gang-raping her and attempting to rape her 17-year-old daughter at his official house in Gautampalli, Lucknow, between 2015 and 2016.
After the case was registered, Prajapati was arrested by the police in March and was there only since then.