A Delhi court has upheld the three-year-jail term of a man convicted for snatching gold earrings from a woman, observing that such incidents have risen tremendously and “there is an urgent need to curb them with a heavy hand”.
“I find that the sentence imposed is not excessive as incidents of chain snatching have grown tremendously… And there is an urgent need to curb them with a heavy hand,” District and Sessions Judge Pradeep Chaddah said, while dismissing the appeal of convict Ravinder and upholding the order of magisterial court.
The trial court had awarded the jail term to Ravinder and his accomplice Haris for snatching earrings of complainant Lata in September 2010 and had also imposed a fine of Rs 30,000 each on them.
Ravinder had challenged the sentence contending that the magisterial court had “erred” in relying on the prosecution case and that the “findings of the trial court were based on conjectures and surmises”.
The sessions court, however, rejected the contention of the convict saying, “It is correct that one of the prosecution witnesses could not identify the convicts but nevertheless she supported the victim’s version that her earrings had been snatched which led to bleeding from her ears.”
“Appellant/convict remained seated on the motorcycle when the other convict Harish got down from the bike and snatched the earrings. The act was done in furtherance of common intention and though Ravinder remained seated on motorcycle, he is equally guilty of the offence,” it said.
According to the complaint, both the convicts, who were on a bike, snatched the earrings of Lata on the morning of September 18, 2010, due to which her ears started bleeding.
Both Ravinder and Harish were arrested immediately and charge sheeted for the offences under sections 356 (Assault or criminal force in attempt to commit theft of property carried by a person), 379 (punishment for theft) and 323(voluntarily causing hurt) read with 34(common intention) of IPC.
