Odisha court relies on minor daughter’s deposition, awards death sentence to drug addict for uxoricide

Relying on the testimony of a minor girl, a Bhubaneswar Court on Thursday awarded capital punishment to her drug addict father, who had gruesomely murdered his wife by stabbing her as many as 33 times two years back.

Terming the murder case as the ‘rarest of rare’ crimes, the Additional District Judge Court-2 held Sanjit Dash guilty and pronounced the death sentence on the basis of circumstantial, material, and medico-legal evidence.

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The court also relied on the deposition of 15 witnesses, including the statement of the convict’s minor daughter, who was the witness to her mother being stabbed to death.

The convict, a drug addict, frequently abused his wife, Saraswati Dash, mentally and physically. The domestic violence spree took a fateful and tragic turn on midnight of 22 June 2022, when, in a fit of rage, Dash stabbed Saraswati 33 times with a kitchen knife.

The convict’s six-year-old daughter offered resistance and tried to save her mother, but she faced the barbaric brutality of her father.

The convict also stabbed the minor in an attempt to eliminate her. However, she survived the murderous attack after battling for life in hospital for three months.

The act of barbarism occurred at the couple’s house in the Ghatikia area under the Khandagiri police station area of the city.