The Supreme Court on Monday sentenced the YSR Congress Party Kurnool 42 nd Ward Corporator Kasireddy Venkateswara Reddy and two others to life imprisonment in a 2007 murder case of III Town police station.
The Supreme Court quashed a verdict of theTS , AP High Court, which had acquitted three persons in the murder of Pullagummi Rajasekhara Reddy, saying the evidence of witnesses cannot be discarded solely on the ground that they were relatives of the deceased. The apex court restored the trial court order which had convicted the three accused and sentenced them to life imprisonment for the offences under section 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code. The apex court directed the accused Kasireddy Ramakrishna Reddy, Kasireddy Rambhupal Reddy and Kasireddy Venkateswara Reddy to surrender within four weeks to undergo the remaining sentence. A bench of Justices M.R . Shah and B.V Nagarathna said there were no major or material contradictions in the deposition of the eye-witnesses and they were consistent insofar as these three accused are concerned.
The top court delivered its verdict on the appeals filed by the State as well as the original complainant who had challenged the High Court’s February 2018 judgement. Besides acquitting the three accused, the High Court had also dismissed the appeal filed by the complainant who had challenged the trial court order acquitting eight other accused in the case. (With inputs from PTI