Breaking Supreme Court Legal Update
New Delhi · Thursday, 06 August 2026 9888666310 | [email protected]
Free Law — free judgments and free headnotes Free Lawby De Jure
Supreme Court of India 2019-08-01 dismissed

MANOHARAN vs STATE BY INSPECTOR OF POLICE, VARIETY HALL POLICE STATION, COIMBATORE

Bench: 3 — Rohinton Fali Nariman, Sanjiv Khanna, Surya Kant

In Brief

A 23-year-old man was convicted of gang rape and murder of two children aged 10 and 7 years. After abducting them, he and an accomplice raped the girl, administered poison, and threw both children into a canal to drown. The Supreme Court upheld convictions based on DNA evidence, witness testimony, and a voluntary confessional statement. However, the Court split 2:1 on sentencing: the majority confirmed the death sentence as a 'rarest of rare' case, while the minority commuted it to life imprisonment without remission, recognizing the appellant's youth, poor background, and confession as mitigating factors warranting an alternative to capital punishment.

The lawyer headnote and full judgment text are available to registered users.

Criminal Law Death Penalty Rape Murder Child Abuse DNA Evidence Confessional Statements Sentencing Aggravating Circumstances Mitigating Circumstances Evidence Child Sexual Abuse

Read the full judgment & headnote. It's free.

Register to read the complete Supreme Court judgment text and the headnote, and to search 1 lakh+ Supreme Court judgments by meaning. It is a free service.

Register Free Login