A Sessions Court here has sentenced nine persons, including two relatives of a Himchal Pradesh minister, to nine months imprisonment for assaulting a lawyer and his family members in 2005.
Sessions Judge SC Kainthal upheld the conviction of nine persons who entered the house of advocate Bhupinder Sharma on the night of January 24, 2005 and assaulted him along with his brother and father with iron rods.
The court said the convicts shall undergo simple imprisonment for six months for offence under IPC section 147 (punishment for rioting) and simple imprisonment for nine months?under IPC section 148 (rioting, armed with deadly weapon).
The were also found guilty under section 504 (Intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) read with with section 149 (offence committed by any member of an unlawful assembly in prosecution of the common object of that assembly…) of IPC among other offences.
All the sentences shall run concurrently, the court said.
Those convicted are Shobha Ram (ex-president of Nagchala gram panchayat), his son Chaman, Laxman Dass and his wife Shakuntla Devi, who are relatives of a state minister, Ram Singh, Bhagi Rath, Ramesh Chand, Hasnu Devi and Kubja Devi, all residents Nagchala.
The daughter of Laxman Dass and Shakuntla was recently married to the son of the state minister.
They were earlier convicted by the Chief Judicial Magistrate in 2011.
The Sessions Judge held that there was no illegality or infirmity in the order passed by Chief Judicial Magistrate and further observed that there was no merit in appeal of the convicts.
Dismissing the appeal, he directed the convicts to surrender their bail bond and undergo the sentence.
