March 25 Rape: NSCN (IM) awards ‘capital punishment’

Dimapur, July 18 (MExN): The NSCN (IM) today said two of the five accused for the March 25 Darogapathar outrage have been sentenced with “capital punishment.” Of the five accused charged with the rape, robbery and reported ‘attempted murder’ in the sensational Darogapathar case, the NSCN (IM) had apprehended two. They are Imti Kumzuk Jamir, 32, of Mongsenyimti village in Mokokchung district and Hetoi Chishi, 32, of Zutovi village in Dimapur

The MIP issued a statement today explaining the turn of criminal events of Dimapur’s fateful March 25 night when a crime of graphic magnitude shocked the entire state. The statement declared the two to be guilty of the crime on all accounts as charged and so awarded “capital punishment,” judged “by the law of the people.”

“…in view of the nature of crime committed by the perpetrators, the GPRN in its penal judgment declared all the accused persons guilty of gang-rape, breaking house, assault, damaged of property, looting and criminal trespass, and hereby awarded capital punishment to the aforementioned two arrested accused persons on 17th July 2009,” the MIP statement said.

The NSCN (IM) narrated the turn of events “based on the facts and evidence available”, “examination” and “cross-examination” of all “admissible evidence” and circumstances leading to the crime and found them “beyond a reasonable doubt to be true.” 

The MIP said Imti Kumzuk and Hetoi with two others (“names withheld,” the statement said) stormed into the house of the victims at Darogapathar (Naharbari), by climbing the wall and breaking the main door open. The four accused on seeing the mother and her daughter (around 26 years old) immediately overpowered and “took advantage over them,” the MIP said. One of the accused, Hetoi Chishi, fired two shots in the air from his Sten-carbine. They locked up the victim’s mother in one room and took her daughter in another  where they, one after another, raped her at gunpoint. 

They fled with Rs. 16,000 along with some jewelry. “It is also learned that the mother was badly assaulted without any provocation,” the MIP said. It also stated that the two accused have been found to be hardened and habitual criminals constantly involved in criminal activities like looting, murder, robbery, theft, drug-trafficking and smuggling, and vehicle-lifting.

“Their acts of breaking a house, damaging property and looting, and above all gang-raping a girl has once again threatened our social institution. Without a homily environment and healthy atmosphere human progress can make no headway,” the ‘MIP’ said. 

“The violation of individual rights to privacy, decency, peace and security ought to be restored. Individual right to live is not a mere animal existence but includes to live with dignity, chastity and freedom,” it added. On the rime of rape, the NSCN (IM) said it is a crime against all humanity, a crime of immorality, human decency… “both in the eyes of man and God.” 

The ‘MIP’ further said that a rapist who defiles human dignity and conducts himself beastly has to be judged severely in order to act as a deterrent in the society. “The victim of such a crime incurs irreparable damage to her reputation and personal life. The stigma she bears will endure throughout her life. No form of justice can justify and mollify such act of crime,” it stated.