Pathankote: A court in Pathankot, on Monday sentenced three men to life imprisonment for the rape and murder of an eight-year-old girl in Rasana Kathua last year.
Three other men were given five-year jail terms for destroying evidence.
The girl, from a nomadic Muslim community that roams the forests of Kashmir, was drugged, held captive in a temple and sexually assaulted for a week before being strangled and battered to death with a stone in January 2018.
The abduction, rape and killing of the child was part of a plan to remove the minority nomadic community from the area, the 15-page charge sheet said.
Among those accused were a Hindu priest and police officers, fanning communal tensions between Hindus and Muslims in the area.
