Cuttack, Sep 7 (PTI) The Orissa High Court on Wednesday refused to grant bail to Dara Singh alias Rabindra Kumar Pal, who was convicted along with three others and sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life in the Father Arul Doss murder case of 1999 in Mayurbhanj district.
Sustaining the conviction and affirming the sentences of all the four, a Division Bench headed by Chief Justice S Muralidhar cancelled the bail bonds of the other three convicts and also asked them to surrender by September 23, failing which the police were directed to take them into custody.
According to the prosecution, a group of persons had gathered around a Church located under the Mahuldiha police station of Mayurbhanj district on the intervening night of September 1 and 2, 1999, when a group of Christians were dancing and singing in front of the church.
“All the four convicts, including Dara Singh, entered into the church with other group members and killed Father Arul Doss, who had sustained multiple injuries with arrows”, the prosecution said, adding that on subsequent police investigation, 21 persons were arrested in this connection.
A trial court, however, had acquitted 17 of them and convicted the rest four sentencing them to rigorous imprisonment for life.
While three of the convicts were subsequently enlarged on bail, Dara Singh was lodged in jail as he was also awarded life imprisonment in Australian missionary Graham Steins and his two minor sons’ murder case in January 1999. PTI COR AAM RG
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Source: The Print