'Accused mustn't be allowed to become state witnesses'

New Delhi: The family of the Delhi braveheart on Monday slammed the move by two of the six accused in the case to become state witnesses, saying this was being done to escape death sentence and wanted the plea to be rejected. "It is not right to allow two of the accused persons as state witnesses as it is nothing but an attempt by them to escape death sentence," the brother of the 23-year-old girl told PTI at their native village.

The father of the girl said there were enough witnesses in the case and there was no need for making the accused persons as witnesses. The girl's grand-father and uncle said the accused who have committed a heinous crime should not get relief of any kind or be made state witnesses.

Out of the four accused, who were produced before Metropolitan Magistrate Jyoti Kler inside her chamber in Delhi on Sunday after expiry of their 14-day judicial remand, Pawan Gupta and Vinay Sharma refused to take the service of legal aid counsel and expressed their willingness to become witnesses on behalf of the state in the gangrape-cum-murder case. There are six accused in all, including a juvenile, in the case.

Legal experts feel that an accused cannot hope to become a witness especially in a case of heinous crime like the brutal gangrape to escape punishment. Usually in a case where investigators find it difficult to gather evidence, they could ask for an accused to become an approver to get crucial evidence and in return, the accused could get lighter sentence or escape punishment, the experts said.

The girl's brother also demanded that jail term for rape case be increased to 30 years from the current maximum punishment of life term. He also favoured lowering the age of juvenile under the criminal justice system to 14 years from the present 18 years. Replying to questions, he objected to wrong names of the victim and her father being reported in a section of the foreign media.

"Though the family has no objection in making the name of the girl and her father public, the names that come out should be correct," he said.