Father Jailed For Murdering Sons In Car

`This is as grave a crime as can be imagined,` said the judge, Lord Brailsford.

A father who stabbed his two young sons to death before trying to set their bodies alight was jailed for a minimum of 21 years on Tuesday.

Ashok Kalyanjee, 46, had admitted murdering Paul Ross, six, and his brother Jay, two, at an earlier hearing and was sentenced at the High Court in Paisley.

Kalyanjee had collected the boys from their mother in Glasgow before driving them to a lay-by and cutting their throats last May, the Press Association reported.

"This is as grave a crime as can be imagined," said the judge, Lord Brailsford.

"The victims were defenceless and no doubt they trusted you and assumed you would take care of them as a father should.

"One of the victims witnessed what happened to his brother. I cannot imagine the suffering he must have endured."

Kalyanjee had poured petrol over his sons and himself and tried to set his silver Mercedes on fire.

But the vehicle failed to go up in flames and police found Kalyanjee at the wheel with a large black-handled knife and the dead boys in the car.

Kalyanjee, who was divorced from the boys' mother, Giselle Ross, left a suicide message on a dictaphone found near his car.

In it he said in Punjabi: "These children are mine and they go with me. This death is near".

The court had heard the boys had been reluctant to go out with their father but he had persuaded them to come with the promise of money to buy toys and a game of football.

Kalyanjee suffered burns and was taken to hospital, remaining in intensive care until June.