A Mumbai court on Thursday sentenced a 45-year-old man to death for raping and murdering a 32-year-old woman in the city’s Saki Naka area, PTI reported.

Additional Sessions Judge (Dindoshi) HC Shende had convicted the man, Mohan Chauhan, on Monday under Indian Penal Code Sections 302 (murder) and 376 (rape) and the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

According to the prosecution, the man had pierced a sharp object into the woman’s genitals on the intervening night of September 9 and 10, The Indian Express reported. The woman was taken to hospital but she died on September 11.

The police alleged in the chargesheet that he raped the woman because she refused to have sex with him.

The court on Thursday said that the crime fell in the category of rarest of rare cases. It took note of the prosecution’s contention that Chauhan left no chance for the woman to survive, as her intestines were badly damaged.

During arguments on the quantum of sentencing on Wednesday, special public prosecutor Mahesh Mule asked for the death sentence for Chauhan, describing the crime as a “gruesome, diabolical attack on a hapless, lonely woman at odd hours of night”, according to The Times of India. He said that the incident had led to fears about the safety of women in Mumbai.

“This is an offence against a woman and that too, a woman belonging to a Scheduled Caste, which makes it more serious,” Mule had argued.

Chauhan’s lawyer Kalpana Waskar claimed that there were several discrepancies in the police’s investigation. She told the court that the lives of Chauhan’s daughters will be ruined if he got a death sentence.