A court here on Saturday sentenced four convicts in the killing of TV journalist Soumya Vishwanathan in 2008 to life imprisonment while the fifth convict was sent to three years in jail.

Ordering the quantum of punishment, the court said the offence does not fall in the category of rarest of rare cases. So request for death penalty is refused, it said.

Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, Baljeet Malik and Ajay Kumar have been sentenced to life imprisonment. The fifth convict, Ajay Sethi, has been sentenced to simple imprisonment for three years.

Vishwanathan, who was working with a leading English news channel, was shot dead in the early hours of September 30, 2008, on south Delhi's Nelson Mandela Marg while she was returning home from work. Police claimed the motive was robbery. On October 18, the court convicted Ravi Kapoor, Amit Shukla, Baljeet Malik, and Ajay Kumar under Indian Penal Code section 302 (murder) and Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) provisions for committing organised crime resulting in the death of any person.

Ajay Sethi was convicted under IPC section 411 (dishonestly receiving stolen property) and MCOCA provisions for conspiring to abet, aid, or knowingly facilitate organised crime and receiving proceeds of organised crime.

According to the prosecution, Ravi Kapoor shot Vishwanathan with a country-made pistol on September 30, 2008, on Nelson Mandela Marg in South Delhi while chasing the victim's car to rob her. Amit Shukla, Ajay Kumar and Baljeet Malik were also with Kapoor.

Police recovered the car used in the murder from the fifth accused Ajay Sethi alias Chacha.

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