Fourteen months after 24-year-old Udit Bharati died after consuming poisoned prasad, his former girlfriend Aditi Sharma and her beau Pravin Khandelwal were sentenced to undergo rigorous life imprisonment for plotting his murder. Additional Sessions Judge S S Phansalkar-Joshi, who had ruled them guilty for murder and criminal conspiracy on Wednesday, delivered the sentence on Thursday afternoon. All three were students of Indian Institute of Modern Management, Wakad.

“I am innocent and have not committed any crime. I do not have any submission to make to the court on the question of the punishment,” responded Aditi when Judge Phansalkar-Joshi asked her whether she had anything to ask or tell the court before her punishment was declared. Pravin echoed Aditi’s response to the Judge’s question, saying he too was completely innocent.

Additional Public Prosecutor Nilima Vartak exhorted the court to grant severe punishment to the accused stressing upon the serious nature of the crime. “Besides the rehabilitative or reformative aspect, the exemplary value of the punishment should also be considered,” said Vartak. “This crime involves two youth groups. While one has helped the police in cracking the case, the other set of youth have perpetrated the crime. Hence, the court should pass a sentence which will help set an example to the other youth in society, deterring them from repeating the act that the accused had performed,” said Vartak.

The accused couple’s counsel Vijayrao Mohite on Wednesday had defended his clients proposing that Udit may have committed suicide because of his break-up with Aditi. However, Vartak argued that Udit who had always excelled in his studies continued to be a top ranker even after the break-up.

“If his break-up with Aditi would have caused him to drown in depression as the defence counsel claims, then his studies should have suffered too. Udit had chosen to continue his MBA degree despite the break-up, but on the other hand both the accused had left the course midway and gone to Gurgaon for jobs. Hence, the presumption of suicide is not justified,” said Vartak.

During the investigation, Aditi and Pravin had claimed that had they visited Pune after six months, for official work rather than to kill Udit. However, Vartak pointed out that upon arriving in Pune they had rented out a hotel room under fake names. Aditi had also called on Udit’s cell phone using a pseudonym, when he was admitted in hospital after consuming the poisoned prasad.

Advocate Mohite cited a Supreme Court judgment to aid his argument that as the case was not a ‘rarest of rare one’, it did not merit a death penalty. “Those murders which have been executed in a professional and brutal manner, involve money or involve children or women as victims are treated as rarest of rare, and the present case does not fall into any of the above categories,” said Mohite.