Salem: A Salem court on Thursday awarded double life terms to seven persons and life term for five others, following their conviction in a double murder case.
The prosecution case was that a group of about 24 persons attacked two persons, S Sundararajan, 25, and S Kuppusamy, 23, from Veeranam in Salem district in 2003 and the duo died in the mob attack in the wake of a civil dispute with one Nadesan, 52, and his kin over collecting funds for a local temple festival.
The prosecution said on July 15 that year, a gang led by Nadesan allegedly assaulted the duo to death. The Veeranam police registered a case on charges of murder against 24 persons including a suspected Maoist Palanivel.
On completion of trial after 15 years, the Salem first additional district and sessions court convicted 12 persons for the double murder.
Pronouncing the verdict, the judge, Mr. M Ravindran awarded double life sentence to seven of the accused including N Nadesan, 52, S Jeganathan, 42, S Kumaravel, 41, S Annamalai, 41, K Selvam, 41, K Thiagarajan, 35 and K Selvaraj, 52. He also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on each.
Similarly, five more accused persons in the case including A Dharmalingam, 42, S Sekar, 43, P Selvam, 40, A Kumaresan, 43 and C Manikkam, 46, were each handed down a life sentence, besides a fine amount of Rs 5,000 on each .
Further, the court imposed a fine of '1,000 each on three women who were allegedly involved in the attack. Five other accused were acquitted in the case.
A separate trial is underway in the split-up case against the suspected Maoist Palanivel, who is lodged in Coimbatore central prison in another case, as he was in hiding when the double murder case was under trial.
Tension prevailed in the court premises for a while as relatives of the convicted persons broke into tears soon after the judgment was pronounced.
They were seen involved in an argument with the police. The convicted persons were sent to Coimbatore prison.
