Shattered by verdict, father says it's saddest day of his life

NEW DELHI/JAMMU: Moments after the apex court commuted the sentence of Priyadarshani Mattoo's killer from death to life term on Wednesday, the victim's father, Chaman Lal Mattoo, called it the saddest day of his life.
"After fighting for 14 long years, I have been left dismayed by this verdict,'' Mattoo said while talking to TOI from his Jammu house. He added that the court should have upheld the death sentence to set an example.
C L Mattoo's feelings were shared by his wife, Professor Rageshwari Mattoo, who termed the decision disappointing. "The case has taken a toll on us and all our life and plans have been ruined by it. The CBI should file a curative petition in the SC. The case was rarest of the rare and HC has appreciated the evidence. Then how has evidence and rarest of rare category changed? The apex court took a lenient view and gave him life term, which means he (Santosh) will again be free in few years," she said.
Terming the judgment a "setback'' to the family, Mattoo's lawyer, Ashok Bhan, said that he would file a review or curative petition seeking enhancement of the punishment after going through the verdict. "He was not an ordinary criminal and, therefore, it (case) was in the rarest of rare category.''
On the other hand, the CBI counsel hailed the outcome of the 14-year-old case. "The probe agency is satisfied as the verdict of the Delhi high court has been upheld,'' the counsel said. The agency had received a lot of flak for losing the case at the trial stage.
Neelam Katara, who is fighting an appeal in the high court in the murder case of her son Nitish Katara, expressed satisfaction with the verdict in the Mattoo case. "I am relieved that the Supreme Court has not changed the findings of the Delhi high court. So far as the reduction of sentence is concerned, I do not know the circumstances in which it has been commuted,'' she said.
"A life term in jail is not a small sentence, if the convicts are not allowed to dodge the system. Our country is not mature enough to grant the benefit of remission to convicts as in foreign countries,'' Katara said.
Activist Aditya Raj Kaul who was the initiator of the campaign Justice for Priyadarshani also welcomed the conviction of the accused. He, however, said that all the activists and the family were disappointed over the reduction of the sentence.