The Sealdah Court sentenced Sanjay Roy to life imprisonment for the rape and murder of a doctor at RG Kar Medical College on Monday. It came when the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) asked for the death penalty based on the submitted plea that the case was one of the "rarest of the rare".

At 2:45 pm, the court session, the judge ruled that the case did not fall under the "rarest of the rare" category, which is a special category of crimes so heinous that they deserve the death penalty. Instead, Roy was sentenced to life imprisonment. During the entire trial, Roy never accepted his guilt.

The CBI had pushed for the death penalty, citing the brutal nature of the crime. However, Roy's lawyer argued against it, presenting similar cases where the death penalty was not applied. The judge agreed, deciding that life imprisonment was the appropriate punishment.

The murdered doctor's family expressed disappointment at the verdict. “We are shocked. How is this not the rarest of rare cases? An on-duty doctor was raped and murdered. We are dismayed. There was a larger conspiracy behind this crime," the mother told news agency PTI.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee criticized the way the case was handled by the CBI, saying that if the local police had handled it, the death sentence could have been given. She added that most people, including herself, were expecting a much more severe punishment.

What makes a case "rarest of the rare"

Legally, some conditions need to be fulfilled for a case to be declared "rarest of the rare":

Aggravating circumstances: The crime must be extremely brutal and deserving of the harshest punishment.

Mitigating circumstances: The court takes into account the background of the convict, mental state, and how much the convict can be rehabilitated.

Collective conscience: The crime must shock society to its core.

Uncommon crime: It should be a crime so unusual that no lesser punishment would be appropriate.

Public abhorrence: The crime must be so heinous that it draws widespread public outrage.

Response to justice: The punishment should satisfy society's call for justice.

"Rarest of the rare" cases in the past

In past rulings, the Supreme Court of India has upheld the death penalty in several cases:

Nirbhaya Case (2012): The case of brutal rape and murder of a young girl in Delhi resulted in a death sentence against the culprits.

Bachan Singh vs. State of Punjab: Here is where the expression "rarest of the rare" was first employed, and since then, capital punishment for extreme cases.

Kehar Singh vs. Delhi Administration: There was the murder of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in which conspirators were given the death penalty.

Dhananjoy Chatterjee (1990): For committing a rape and killing a young girl, Chatterjee was executed in 2004.

Ajmal Kasab (2008): He was the key figure in the Mumbai terror attacks, for which he was sentenced to death.

While pronouncing the sentence, the judge ordered Roy to pay Rs 10 lakh to the victim's family. The victim's father declined the money, stating that all he wanted was justice. The judge emphasized that the compensation was a statutory requirement, not a substitute for justice.