lower community. Kousalya decided to move away from her home and get married. The pair got married in spit of opposition from the girl's family and started living in Sankar's house. Kousalya quit her college and started working in tiles factory to support the education of Sankar. On 13 March 2016, the pair went to the market in the town to buy shirt for the annual day celebration in Sankar's college. The pair was attacked by a gang of six armed men near the Town Busstand in Udumalaipet. The men who came on bike started attacking Sankar with their sickles till he collapsed. They then turned on to Kousalya and attacked her. Sankar lost his life on the spot, while Kousalya was grievously injured. The police conducted an identification parade and identified all the killers. The whole incident was captured in CCTV (Closed Circuit Television) camera in the opposite shop. Court proceedings The case was conducted in Tiruppur district court from 2016. The prosecution produced B. Chinnasamy, father of Kousalya as chief conspirator (A1), Annalakshmi, the mother of Kousalya as co-conspirator (A2), Pandithurai, Kousalya's uncle as co-conspirator (A3), Jegadesan, a friend of Chinnaswamy as mastermind (A4), Manikandan alias Palani for hiring the hitmen (A5), Selvakumar as a family friend & executor (A6), Kalaitamilvaanan, a member of the gang (A7), and Mathan alias Michael and a member of gang (A8). There were four other produced as police as gangmen namely Madan, K. Dhanraj, V. Prasanna and Manikandan. The prosecution accused Chinnaswamy, Kousalya's father for abetting and coorabrating the murder. Based on the arguments and the documentary and video evidence produced, the court pronounced the sentence on 12 December 2017. The court sentenced Chinnaswamy and five others namely, Jegadeesan, Manikandan, Selvakumar, Kalai Tamilvaanan and Madan to death sentence, K.Dhanraj to life sentence and one another to five year imprisonment. The Justice J Alamelu Natarajan acquitted Kousalya's mother, who was also accused in the prosecution. The Court also ordered a compensation of 11.95 lakhs from the perpetrators as a compensation to be equally split between Kousalya and Velusamy, Sankar's father. The case was the second in terms of most number of death sentences in a single case. The sentenced challenged the judgement in the High court of Tamil Nadu against the appeal. The state also appealed to the High Court against releasing Kousalya's mother and other accused who were not sentenced. The appeal