Bhopal, Sep 4 (IANS): A district court in Madhya Pradesh on Wednesday awarded death sentence to a man for raping and killing his minor niece in 2021.

Suresh Kumar Choube, the Additional District Judge (ADJ) of Sohagpur court in Narmadapuram district, found the accused guilty of rape and murder and awarded death sentence.

Before pronouncing the judgement, ADJ Choube read a quatrain from the Ramcharitamanas and said, "Raping an innocent, minor girl falls under heinous crime. And, killing a minor after raping her can't be judged as a normal case."

The investigation by Sohagpur police, the DNA reports, and the testimony of the victim's elder brother, who is also a minor, led the court to decide the fate of the accused, who is the maternal uncle of the victim.

The heinous crime was committed on December 25, 2021. The Sohagpur police upon receiving a missing complaint carried out a search and found the victim's body on the rooftop of her house.

After committing the crime, the accused misled the victim's family and the police by pretending that he too was searching for the 'missing' girl.

The autopsy report revealed that the victim was sexually assaulted before being smothered to death.

The police nabbed the accused on the basis of bite marks on the victim's body. The case had triggered widespread anger among the residents of Sohagpur who staged a massive protest, blocking highways and roads besides laying siege to the offices of the district collector and the superintendent of police demanding death penalty for the accused.