Swapan Gazi, a 24 year old Bangladeshi, was sentenced...

Swapan Gazi, a 24 year old Bangladeshi, was sentenced to death by hanging for hurling acid on his nine-year-old wife, leaving her partially deaf and blind. It was alleged that the accused poured a glass of acid on the girl's face and head after she refused to leave her parents' house for his. The attack happened in 1998 at a slum in the industrial town of Tongi in Gazipur district, about 30 kilometres north of the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka. ``This ruling will help deter others who commit such crimes,'' Salma Ali of the Bangladesh National Women Lawyers Association. The accused had pleaded not guilty. His lawyers planned to appeal the verdict in a higher court. Gazi reportedly forced the third grader into marrying him without her parents consent, in 1998. The girl's father, a poor rickshaw puller, refused to let her set up housekeeping with Gazi, saying she could not leave her family until she came of age. A month after their marriage, Gazi went to the girl's house and insisted that she come away with him. He threw acid on her when she refused. Neighbours who heard her cries caught Gazi and turned him in to police.