Engineering faculty student’s murder in 1997 - Court upholds death sentence for convict

The Court of Appeal today upheld the death sentence imposed against the accused who committed the murder of his fellow junior student Selvanayagam Varapragash who was an Engineering Faculty student at Peradeniya University in 1997.

However, the main accused Balendran Prasad Sadeeskaran was never served with summons during the trial as his whereabouts were unknown.

The Court had issued a warrant for his arrest.

The victim Selvanayagam Varapragash was a first-year engineering student at that time, to inhumane ragging which resulted in his death. 

After the incident on the 6th of October 1997 and after receiving treatment for some time, he passed away on 26th of October 1997.

According to the evidence made available to the trial Court that the main accused as well as the other students who were involved in the ragging of the deceased were second year students of the Faculty of Engineering. It was revealed that the deceased was a first-year student or in other words, being a fresher to the faculty had been the reason for him being subjected to this kind of ragging of inhumane nature. It is in evidence that the deceased was taken forcibly from the faculty to a house where the accused and other students lived and was subjected to ragging. When the first witness saw the deceased, he was almost naked and doing sit-ups as ordered by the accused.

The prosecution evidence revealed that the deceased had identified the accused’s photograph and two other photographs as the persons involved in ragging him while he was receiving treatment.

The deceased’s father was Dr. Sivaguru Selvavinayagan Prakashan, a doctor by profession. The deceased was his only son and his daughter was elder to the deceased.
During the post mortem, the Judicial Medical Officer revealed that acute renal failure due to muscle injury following physical exertion was the cause of death. He has opined that the internal injuries to the deceased have occurred due to him being subjected to excessive physical exercise.

The Court of Appeal observed that there was ample evidence before Trial Judge to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused had the required knowledge of his action in terms of the 4th limb of section 294 of the Penal Code for committing the murder.

“No one can believe such serious injuries can occur if the person who forced the accused to do such extreme exercise in the name of ragging unless he does that knowing very well that his actions are imminently dangerous and likely to cause death”. These are the observations made by Court of Appeal Justices Sampath Abayakoon and P. Kumararatnam while delivering their judgment regarding this appeal.
 
Balendran Prasad Sadeeskaran was the first accused in the case and failed to appear before the Court from the very inception of the case. There had been eight students accused of committing this crime. After the conclusion of the non-summary inquiry, the Magistrate of Kandy has committed three of the accused to stand trial before the High Court. However, on the instructions of the Attorney General, one of them had been discharged from the proceedings due to lack of evidence, and Balendran Prasad Sadeeskaran and the second accused were indicted before Kandy High Court.

The second accused had pleaded guilty to a lesser offence. After trial in 2014, the main accused was sentenced in his absence for the punishment of death. The main accused had given instructions to his lawyer to file this appeal