JAIPUR, INDIA — A court in the northern Indian state of Rajasthan has sentenced a man to death for the brutal murder of his wife, whom he had reportedly taunted over her skin colour.
The victim, identified as Lakshmi, stated in her dying declaration that her husband, Kishanlal, regularly abused her for her “dark complexion.” The court documents detail a harrowing account from June 24, 2017, when Kishanlal handed his wife a bottle, claiming it contained a medicine to lighten her skin. When Lakshmi complained that the liquid smelled like acid, he set her on fire.
Judge Rahul Choudhary described the act as a “rarest of the rare” crime and “a crime against humanity.” According to NDTV, the court handed down the death sentence to instill fear in society, noting the increasingly brutal nature of such cases. The verdict further stated that Kishanlal “broke her trust” and displayed “excessive cruelty,” with his actions “reflecting a heinous mindset rooted in prejudices about skin tone.”
Public prosecutor Dinesh Paliwal, who presented 14 witnesses and 36 documents, hailed the ruling as “historic.” He told the BBC, “A young woman in her early 20s was murdered brutally. She was someone’s sister, someone’s daughter, there were people who loved her. If we don’t save our daughters, then who would?”
The court’s verdict concluded: “The extremely heart-wrenching and brutal act was not only a crime against his wife, the deceased Laxmi, but it causes such a shock to the consciousness of entire humanity that it cannot even be imagined in a healthy and civilised society.”
While the case has been forwarded to the high court for confirmation of the death sentence, Kishanlal’s lawyer, Surendra Kumar Menariya, maintained that Lakshmi’s death was accidental and vowed to appeal the decision.
Source: African Publicity
