A court in Tripura on Saturday (June 3) handed life imprisonment to four individuals and also imposed a fine of Rs 50,000 each for killing a bank official, Bodhisatta Das, in August 2019.
According to prosecution lawyer Samrat Kar Bhowmik, the District and Session Judge of West Tripura District, Subhasish Sharma Roy convicted Sumit Bank, Sumit Chowdhury, Sukanta Biswas and Omar Sharif a.k.a. Shoaib Mia for murdering Das on the intervening night of August 3-4 in 2019.
The four killed Das in Agartala after an argument broke out over urinating on the roadside. Both — the victim and the accused, were drunk at the time of the incident.
The trial in the case continued for over three years.
In the course of the trial, 56 people came forward as witnesses.
Sukanta Biswas was a traffic police sub-inspector, while the others were traders.
“Of the 56 witnesses, two — Basu Kar, and Dr. Abhijit Das of GBP hospital’s trauma centre, turned hostile. Separate proceedings would be undertaken against them for bearing false witness,” Kar Bhowmik told the media.
Defence lawyer and senior advocate Pijush Kanti Biswas, expressing his unhappiness over the judgement, said that he will file an appeal against the district court’s verdict in the Tripura High Court.
