Dec 16 Delhi gang-rape convicts would have killed me too: Carpenter

NEW DELHI: A man, who was allegedly robbed by the December 16 gangrape case convicts before they targeted the 23-year-old girl, today told a Delhi court that he too could have been killed if he was not thrown out of the moving bus by them.


"If I was not thrown, I would have been killed by the accused," Ram Adhar, a carpenter by profession, told this to Additional Sessions Judge Daya Prakash during his deposition as a prosecution witness in the case.

Ram Adhar had earlier identified the four adult accused -- Mukesh (26), Vinay Sharma (20), Pawan Gupta (19) and Akshay Singh Thakur (28) -- who were present in the courtroom and had said they had beaten and robbed him.

The accused allegedly lured Ram Adhar into the bus and robbed him before raping and assaulting the girl in a moving bus in south Delhi on December 16 last year. The girl died in a Singapore hospital.

The four persons were convicted by a special fast track court on September 10 in the gang-rape case. It is scheduled to pronounce tomorrow the quantum of sentence, which may extend to death penalty.

Ram Adhar also told the court that he had identified the bus in which the incident had occurred by its "physical appearance" and registration number during the probe into the case.

"It is incorrect to suggest that I was never robbed by the accused persons present in the court today. It is incorrect to suggest that I am deposing falsely," he said.

During his cross examination by advocate Asim Ali, who appeared on behalf of the four adult accused, Ram Adhar said he had boarded the bus on the fateful night.

"It is incorrect to suggest that I was not standing at the bus stop. It is incorrect to suggest that I did not board the bus in question. I identified the bus by physical appearance and registration number of the bus.

"At the time of identifying the bus, I went only up to the gate of the bus and from there I looked inside the bus and identified the same. When I was thrown, there were many persons but nobody helped me," he told the court.

During the proceedings today, the court also completed the recording of statements of six other prosecution witnesses.