Mumbai: Fifteen years after Keenan Santos and Reuben Fernandez were stabbed to death in Mumbai while allegedly protecting their female friends from harassment, the Bombay High Court on Thursday upheld the murder conviction of one accused but acquitted two others of the murder charge.
A bench of Justices M S Karnik and Sandesh Patil on Thursday upheld the conviction of Jitendra Rana for the offence of murder, but reduced the life sentence imposed on him in 2016 by a special court to 20 years in jail.
The bench acquitted two others of murder, but upheld their conviction for causing simple hurt and the one-year sentence imposed by the special court in 2016.
Keenan Santos (24) and Reuben Fernandez (29) were fatally stabbed outside an eatery at Amboli in Mumbai's Andheri area on October 20, 2011, after confronting a group of men who were harassing their two female friends.
In 2016, the special court convicted four persons - Jitendra Rana, Satish Dulgaj, Sunil Both and Deepak Piwal - in the case on charges of murder and other offences and sentenced them to life imprisonment.
One of the accused - Dulgaj - died during the pendency of their appeal in the High Court against the conviction.
The special court had convicted Rana and Dulgaj also on the charge of molestation, apart from murder.
The High Court bench on Thursday upheld the conviction of Rana for the offence of murder, but reduced the life sentence imposed on him by the special court to 20 years in jail.
"Considering his age (Rana was 25 at the time of the incident), we are reducing the life sentence to 20 years in jail but without any remission," the HC said.
The bench acquitted two others - Both and Piwal - of the charge of murder, noting it does not stand against them. The High Court, however, upheld their conviction on the charge of causing simple hurt and said the one-year sentence imposed on them by the special court stands.
The duo is likely to be released from jail if there is no other case pending against them.
Santos and Fernandez had confronted the accused and slapped one of them.
The accused then left the spot, extending death threats, and returned with knives, a cricket stump and a big bamboo stick and launched the "fatal assault", the prosecution said.
The defence lawyers argued that the alleged molestation had never occurred and the fight took place after the victims slapped one of the accused.