Justice Served: Unraveling a Decade of Disturbing Child Exploitation in Uttar Pradesh

In a landmark verdict, a special court in Uttar Pradesh's Banda on Friday sentenced a former junior engineer of the Irrigation Department, Ram Bhawan, and his wife, Durgawati, to death for their involvement in the sexual exploitation of 33 minor boys over a decade.

The court, under the POCSO Act, declared the crimes as 'rarest of rare', highlighting the systemic abuse by the couple between 2010 and 2020. The verdict included convictions for aggravated penetrative sexual assault and the creation of child sexual abuse material.

In addition to the death sentence, the Uttar Pradesh government was instructed to provide Rs 10 lakh compensation to each victim. The CBI's investigation underscored the couple's heinous activities, detailing the emotional trauma and physical harm inflicted on the victims. The case was exposed through the monitoring of child sexual abuse material on the internet.