By IANS,
Vancouver : An Indian Canadian, who killed his two-year-old daughter last year in Delta near here, was jailed for 11 years Friday.
Forty-eight-year-old Lakhvinder Singh Kahlon had slit the throat of his toddler on the morning of Jan 18 last year at the family home when his wife, Manjit, was away to drop their two elder daughters at school.
When she returned home, the wife found the two-year-old Ravinder beheaded.
A construction worker, Kahlon had already had two daughters and was not happy about the birth of Ravinder. After her birth, he had gone into depression, left his work and started staying at home most of the time.
Kahlon, who faced first-degree murder charge, had pleaded guilty to second-degree murder Monday in the provincial British Columbia Supreme Court in New Westminster near here.
He faced a mandatory life term, with the possibility of a parole after spending 10 to 25 years in jail.
While the prosecution pleaded that he must spend 12 to 13 years in jail before being eligible for parole, the defence argued that he should be allowed parole after 10 years.
In the end, the judge decided to jail him for 11 years after hearing a forensic psychiatrist Thursday that Kahlon was in deep depression just before the crime and had sought psychiatric help just two days before killing his daughter.
Speaking for the defence, the psychiatrist told the court that Kahlon was on anti-depressant medication before the crime.
He said Kahlon’s wife had told police that he would often complain about “bugs in his head that would not stop.”
The judge called it “an extremely difficult case for everyone involved.”