Chander was angry that his daughter married ‘beneath’ her caste.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: An elderly Indian national in Oak Forest, Illinois, Subhash Chander, 65, has been sentenced to life in prison without parole for maliciously setting fire to an apartment building and burning his daughter, son-in-law, and 3-year-old grandson alive.
A jury had previously convicted Chander of three counts of first-degree murder for pouring gasoline outside the apartment of his 22-year-old daughter following an argument and setting it ablaze.
Monika Rani, who was pregnant with her second child; her husband, Rajesh Arora, 30; and their son, Vansh Kumar, all perished in the December 29, 2007 fire that razed the entire top floor of their 36-unit building at 15859 LeClaire Ave., reported The Chicago Tribune.
No other residents of the apartment complex were killed, but many were forced to defenestrate themselves in order to escape the crackling inferno. The building was burned down.
During Chander’s sentencing on May 14, Circuit Court Judge Thomas Brewer said he could not fathom what drove Chander to commit the arson, and that instead of acting as a loving father and grandfather he ruthlessly “incinerate[d] his grandson, his daughter, and his son-in-law.”
While no motive for the heinous act of filicide was presented at the trial, CBS reported Chander had never taken a liking to his son-in-law because he was enraged that his daughter “married below her station” on the basis of India’s arcane caste system.
“Apparently there’s been trouble going on between the two of them for years. It’s pretty clear from the defendant’s own statements and other evidence that we have that he did not like his son-in-law at all,” Assistant State’s Attorney Robert Milan told the Chicago Tribune in 2008.
The Daily Mail disclosed testimony that indicated Chander had an argument with his daughter and was drinking at his home right before surveillance cameras caught him pouring gasoline on the front porch of her two-story building across the street from where lived, and lighting it on fire.
Even Judge Brewer was visibly shocked and appalled by Chander’s actions according to The Tribune. He summarized the case as “one of the most shocking” that he had ever presided over and described the triple-homicide as one of the most “callous and cruel commissions of murder” he was likely to see in his lifetime.