A court in Odisha on Friday sentenced to death a man who murdered a minor girl and then indulged in sex with her corpse in the state's Jharsuguda district.

District and sessions judge Shyam Sunder Mishra pronounced the capital punishment to 22-year-old Minaketan Seth at the district headquarters town of Jharsuguda for the crime he committed in Kandeikela village Oct 9, 2009.

Seth intercepted the girl when she was returning home after giving a lunch box to her father in a nearby crop field and and took her to a secluded place. He then strangulated her before violating her corpse.

He was later arrested and charge-sheeted on the basis of the information provided by eyewitnesses.

"The judge described the crime as rarest of the rare," government lawyer Parsuram Mohapatra said. Defence lawyer Anil Goyal said his client would move a higher court against the sentence.