Delhi:The Supreme Court today transferred the case of alleged rape and murder of an eight-year-old girl in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua district to Pathankot court.
However, the apex court refused a CBI inquiry in the matter after relying on the state investigation.
The court also said that day to day hearing would take place in the matter and the proceedings would be held in-camera . Next date of hearing in the case is July 9.
The apex court had earlier stayed the trial of the accused till today in the case before the Sessions judge.
The victim, an eight-year-old girl from a minority nomadic community, had disappeared from near her home in a village near Kathua in the Jammu region on January 10. Her body was found in the same area a week later.
The apex court had earlier given a stern warning and said it would transfer the Kathua gangrape-and-murder case from the local court in the “slightest possibility” of lack of fair trial, saying the “real concern” was to hold proper prosecution.
The girl’s father had moved the apex court earlier, apprehending threat to the family, a friend and their lawyer Deepika Singh Rajawat. A separate plea was also filed by two accused seeking that the trial in the case be held in Jammu and the probe handed over to the CBI.
The state police’s Crime Branch, which probed the case, filed the main charge sheet against seven persons and a separate charge sheet against a juvenile in a court in Kathua district last week. The charge sheet revealed chilling details about how the girl was allegedly kidnapped, drugged and raped inside a place of worship before being killed.