New Delhi: Delhi Minister Kapil Mishra on Friday welcomed the life imprisonment awarded to former Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Councillor Tahir Hussain, convicted for the murder of Intelligence Bureau (IB) officer Ankit Sharma during the Delhi riots in February 2020.
Kapil Mishra took to his official X account to welcome the court judgement and hailed the life term for Hussain and four others, as “the beginning of justice”.
Recalling the brutality and savagery inflicted on the IB officer during the Delhi riots, the Delhi Minister said that the cruelty with which Ankit Sharma was murdered, stabbed with knives even after death and the body thrown into a drain — accounts for “rarest of the rare” cases.
He also hoped that that life imprisonment gets converted into death penalty as the case goes to the higher Court.
The convicted ex-Councillor is likely to move to Delhi High Court to challenge his conviction and seeking relief in the IB officer’s murder case.
Delhi’s Karkardooma court which pronounced life term for Tahir Hussain made some strong observations in the case, describing the act as that of ‘extreme brutality’.
“The manner of the crime was of utmost brutality,” the court said while announcing the life sentence for Tahir Hussain.
“The crime tilts towards the rarest of rare. The monstrosity of the crime also outweighs the mitigating circumstances,” it added.
Ankit Sharma (26), a security assistant with the IB was brutally murdered by the violent mob, having caught in the communal violence that swept through the North-East Delhi in February 2020.
He was dragged, attacked with rods and stones and stabbed with knives allegedly at the directions of Tahir Hussian.
The investigation into bestiality inflicted on him deduced that he was stabbed repeatedly even after losing consciousness and as many as 51 knife wounds were found on his corpse.
A day later, his body was found dumped in a filthy drain and was pulled out by cops, only after his parents lodged his missing report with the police.
According to the chargesheet, Ankit had gone to pacify two warring groups near Tahir Hussain’s house, when he was surrounded by the mob, dragged inside the building and killed in cold blood.
Earlier this month, the court convicted Hussain, Javed, Anas, Nazim and Kasim after holding them guilty of offences, including murder, kidnapping, rioting and promoting enmity between different groups.
(IANS)
