Pakistan court awards death sentence to 6 in Priyantha Kumara lynching

A Pakistani court on Monday awarded the death sentence to six and handed life imprisonment to seven as it announced its verdict in Sri Lankan citizen Priyantha Kumara's lynching case that had sparked nationwide outrage.

The lynching of Priyantha Kumara in Sialkot last year over blasphemy allegations by a hardline mob was seen as evidence of the rising religion-based hatred violence in the country.

Kumara was lynched by a mob comprising hundreds of protesters, including the employees of the factory in Sialkot he was the manager of, on December 3. The mob had tortured him to death and later burnt his body, Dawn newspaper reported.

An anti-terrorism court had indicted 89 individuals accused of the lynching on March 12.

The Sri Lankan factory manager who was killed by a mob in Pakistan over alleged blasphemy, was tortured to an extreme degree and his skull and other bones of the body also had severe damage, the post-mortem report revealed.

The report has confirmed a broken skull and burn wounds damaging 99 per cent of the tissues of Priyantha Diyawadana's body, ARY News reported.

Diyawadana's death occurred owing to multiple hits on his skull. All bones of the body except that of a leg were found broken, the report said showing the impact of the extreme torture Diyawadana had to bear before his death.

( With inputs from ANI )