Bhubaneswar: After 11 years, 11 accused have been convicted in the highly publicized Shanti Mishra murder case. The Ganjam district and sessions judge sentenced all of them to life imprisonment while pronouncing the verdict; however, one of the accused remains at large.
On January 29, 2013, Shanti Mishra, a youth with a criminal past, visited the Gosaninuagan police station in the morning for an appearance. Later, while returning home on his bike, he stopped near the Gundicha Temple in Gosaninuagan for a while and had tea at a local shop.
At that time, Rakesh Panda, Tukuna Behera, Satish Kumar Sahu, Mrutyunjay Sabat, Santosh Panigrahi, Budu Das, Ganesh Panigrahi, S. K. Zafar, Babaji Rana, Sankarshan Padhi, Mauz Mishra, and Shankar Behera collectively attacked him. They hacked Mishra with swords and threw a bomb, killing him instantly.
Following the attack, the accused fled. After being charged, the police registered a case, arrested all the accused, and forwarded them to court. Today, after 11 years, the judgment has been announced.
Based on the statements of 26 witnesses and other evidence, the court convicted 11 people in the case and sentenced them to life imprisonment. However, Mauz Mishra, one of the accused, remains at large since he was out on bail.
