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HomeCity NewsPallavi Purkayastha murder case: Court to pronounce quantum of sentence Monday

Pallavi Purkayastha murder case: Court to pronounce quantum of sentence Monday

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A Mumbai court on Thursday adjourned the pronouncement of quantum of sentence in the Pallavi Purkayastha murder case to Monday.

Sajjad A Mogal, the security watchman of the building where the woman lawyer stayed, has been convicted in the case.

The court has found Mogal guilty of molestation, criminal trespass and murder of Purkayastha, the daughter of a senior bureaucrat couple, in Mumbai two years ago.
The accused, Sajjad A Mogal, 23, was working at Himalayan Heights skyscraper in Wadala in south Mumbai where Pallavi Purkayastha (25) lived at the time of the attack on August 09, 2012.

Purkayastha was killed after she fought off Mogal’s advances in her home and complained to her fiancé Avik Sengupta.

Sessions Judge Vrushali Joshi, pronouncing Mogal guilty, had said that “a case of murder, molestation and criminal trespass has been proved” against him.

After painstaking investigations, the police filed a 434-page chargesheet against Mogal in October 2012. During the trial, a total of 43 witnesses were examined.

Mogal refuted all allegations and his lawyer Wahab Khan contended that the victim’s fiancé Sengupta had killed her in their flat.

The police investigations revealed that Mogal, hailing from Jammu and Kashmir and posted as a watchman in the building, used to ogle at Pallavi whenever she passed by.

Later, in his statement, Mogal confessed that using a duplicate key, he entered Purkayastha’s flat and attempted to force himself on her.

However, she resisted and started screaming at which he panicked and attacked her with a knife he was carrying, he said in the statement.

Shortly after the ruling, the parents – Atanu Purkayastha, a joint secretary at the Centre when Pallavi was killed, and mother Sunita, who is director-general in the Ministry of Telecommunications – expressed satisfaction with the police investigations and the verdict.

Avik Sengupta, who was one of the witnesses in the case and had deposed in the trial, died of natural causes in November 2013.

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