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Aarushi murder case: Allahabad HC demolishes CBI

By Fnf Desk | PUBLISHED: 14, Oct 2017, 10:19 am IST | UPDATED: 14, Oct 2017, 10:21 am IST

Aarushi murder case: Allahabad HC demolishes CBI

Gaziabad: Ordering the release of Rajesh and Nupur Talwar, sentenced to life imprisonment four years ago by a special CBI court for the murder of their teenaged daughter Aarushi and domestic help Hemraj in May 2008, the Allahabad High Court has meticulously detailed instances of falsification of evidence by investigating agencies — ranging from “subjective findings” by medical and forensic experts to tutoring of a witness and planting of another, evidence tampering to “deliberate concealment” of evidence.

These instances, recorded by the High Court bench of Justices B K Narayana and A K Mishra in their 273-page judgment Thursday, span every crucial aspect of the case and its investigation — the motive of the crime, the murder weapon used, the possibility of people other than the Talwars being in the house at the time of the killings.

Postmortem report

The CBI had said that the motive behind the double murder was “grave and sudden provocation” after Rajesh Talwar found his daughter and Hemraj in a “compromising position”. But the High Court pointed out that though the report on the postmortem of Aarushi, conducted by Dr Sunil Kumar Dohre, did not contain even a “faint indication” that she was subjected to any kind of sexual assault, Dohre, in his deposition before the trial court, said her vaginal cavity had a whitish discharge, and the vaginal canal was visible because the opening was so visible, indicating manipulation during rigor mortis

The bench found that Dohre’s testimony had “material improvements” based on “subjective findings which have no place in forensic science”. “The aforesaid description of the deceased’s vagina by Dr Sunil Kumar Dohre in his evidence recorded before the trial court was conspicuous by its absence not only in the postmortem report of the deceased which was prepared by him but also in his three statements recorded under Section 161 CrPC. In all his aforesaid statements, he had remained consistent with the finding recorded by him in his postmortem report, especially with regard to the genitalia of Aarushi.” It noted that Dohre was part of an expert committee of forensic science which looked at the postmortem reports of Hemraj and Aarushi, and the committee’s findings were consistent with Dohre’s original postmortem report. 

Relying primarily on the testimony of Bharti Mandal, the CBI attempted to prove the impossibility of anybody else being in the Talwar home. But the bench said her testimony during cross-examination indicated she was a “tutored witness”.

A maid employed by the Talwars, Mandal had arrived at the residence on the day of the murder at 6 am. As a prosecution witness, she told the trial court that she “put her hand on the outer grill door but it did not open”. The CBI said this indicated that the door had been shut from inside. The bench, however, pointed to a statement in her cross-examination where she said, “Whatever was taught/explained to me, the same statement I have stated.”

“The aforesaid piece of testimony of Bharti Mandal clearly indicates that Bharti Mandal is a tutored witness and whatever incriminating facts were stated by her in the court for the first time were taught/explained to her,” the bench said.

Planted witness

Sanjay Chauhan, the then staff officer of the district magistrate, said he had visited the Talwar home on May 16, 2008. He said he saw police vans outside while on a morning walk, and that there was blood on the “floor and the railing”. The bench said Chauhan was a “planted witness as the CBI has not been able to come up with any cogent answer to the query of the defence as to how the CBI came to know about the visit of Sanjay Chauhan to L-32 Jalvayu Vihar”. Chauhan had said in his testimony to the trial court that he had not spoken to police officers at the scene of the crime.

Murder weapon

The CBI had said that a golf club was used by Rajesh Talwar to strike the heads of Aarushi and Hemraj, after which their throats were slit using a surgical scalpel. But the bench said: “There is evidence on record showing that the golf club, which was handed over by appellant Dr Rajesh Talwar, was neither properly sealed nor kept in Maalkhana and the same had been tampered with.”

Deliberate concealment

The bench noted that the results of a sound test — it was conducted by CBI in June 2008 to check the claims of Rajesh and Nupur Talwar that they could not have heard sounds emanating from Aarushi’s bedroom where the murders took place — were “deliberately concealed from the cognisance of the trial court”. The bench said the test vindicated the claim of the appellants, and officials who were part of the test deliberately did not disclose the test with “oblique motives”

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