Man gets life term for shooting dead friend out of envy

Banda:

A court here has sentenced a youth to life term for shooting dead a man 13 years ago out of envy that his girlfriend often talked to the victim.

Additional Sessions Judge Pawan Kumar Sharma sentenced Rasool Khan on Tuesday after convicting him of murdering 22-year-old Aftab Ali by pumping bullets in his head from point-blank range on July 27, 2007, said Assistant Government Advocate Devdutt Mishra.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 35,000 on the convict, he said.

The prosecution counsel said the case dated back to 2007 when Khan was having an affair with a neighbourhood girl, who often used to talk to the victim.

This made Khan envious of Ali as he suspected that the girl was getting attracted towards him, argued the prosecution counsel during the hearing.

Khan subsequently took Ali on his motorcycle on the pretext of getting his fridge repaired and shot dead Ali in Khutala locality of Banda, said the prosecution counsel.

The counsel said after killing Ali, Khan told his family member that he died in an accident.

But during the post-mortem, it transpired that Ali had died of a bullet wound in his head following which the police registered a case of murder and picked up Khan for questioning.

During the questioning, he confessed to having shot dead Ali out of envy, the counsel said.