7 years after a parcel bomb killed newly-wed man in Odisha, English professor gets life term

Sahu was killed and his wife Reema critically injured by a bomb hidden in a wedding gift.

A court in Odisha’s Bolangir district on Wednesday convicted the lone accused in the 2018 Patnagarh parcel bomb case that killed two people, including a 26-year-old newly-wed man.

Punjilal Meher, then a lecturer in a local college, has been sentenced to life imprisonment.

The ruling, in what was India’s first parcel bomb case, came seven years after Meher allegedly sent a bomb to the victim in the form of a wedding gift. The court of the additional district judge (ADJ) also imposed a fine of Rs 50,000 on Meher, who was present at the time of the ruling.

Soumya Sekhar, a man in his mid-twenties, and his 85-year-old grandmother were killed in the blast. His wife, Seema Sahoo, suffered critical injuries when the parcel bomb, disguised as a wedding gift, exploded at their Patnagarh home in Bolangir district on February 23, 2018.

The blast had taken place when the groom opened the gift.

Following a request by the new bride and her family, the then chief minister Naveen Patnaik had ordered the Crime Branch to probe into the incident, PTI reported.

The court has convicted Meher under Sections 302 (murder), 307 (attempt to murder) and 201 (destroy evidence of a crime) of IPC and Sections 3 and 4 of the Explosive Substances Act.

Punjilal Meher, a lecturer at Jyoti Vikas College in Bhainsa, had a professional enmity with the groom's mother at the college where she worked as the principal. Due to this reason, Punjilal hatched the conspiracy to kill her son Soumya and sent the bomb as a wedding gift in 2018, the police said, according to PTI.

Driven by jealousy, Meher had meticulously planned the attack, turning to the internet to learn how to make bombs. He had even used his mobile phone to track the parcel’s journey to Sahu’s home, according to a report by News18.

According to OdishaTV, items recovered from Meher’s possession, including gunpowder, wiring, a partially burned diary, and computer data, were central to the prosecution.

(With inputs from PTI)