Dentist couple Rajesh and Nupur Talwar, were on Tuesday given life imprisonment by an special CBI court in Ghaziabad for killing their 14-year-old daughter Aarushi and their domestic help Hemraj.
Earlier in the day, while arguing on the quantum of punishment, the CBI had sought death penalty for Rajesh and Nupur Talwar as it called the murder of Aarushi and Hemraj a ‘rarest of the rare case’. The defence, on the other hand appealed for leniency.
Pronouncing the quantum of punishment for Talwars, the court gave life imprisonment under Sections 302 (murder), five years in jail for both under Section 201 (destruction of evidence).
Aarushi’s father Rajesh, who was also found guilty under Section 203 for misleading the police by filing a fake FIR, was sentenced to additional one year.
The Talwars will challenge the sentence in Allahabad High Court, reports said.
After five-and-a-half years of twists and turns in the sensational 2008 double murders , the court on Monday held the Talwars guilty under the charges of murder with common intent and destruction of evidence with common intent.
In his 204-page judgement, Additional sessions judge Shyam Lal said the couple had flouted the “ferocious penal code of the land” and had breached the commandment “thou shall not kill” and the injunction of the Holy Quran, “take not life which God has made sacred”.
After the CBI court pronounced its verdict, the dentist couple were taken into custody and brought to Dasna jail. Nupur Talwar suffered high blood pressure and anxiety after she and her husband Rajesh were brought to the Dasna jail.