Umaria (MP), Feb 2 (PTI) Family members of Anish Awadhiya, one of the two engineers killed in the 2024 Pune Porsche accident case, expressed disappointment over the Supreme Court granting bail to three persons accused of helping tamper with blood samples after the incident.
The case relates to a May 19, 2024, incident in which a Porsche car allegedly driven by a 17-year-old boy under the influence of alcohol, fatally knocked down two IT professionals — Anish Awadhiya and Ashwini Koshta — in Pune’s Kalyani Nagar area.
Reacting to the Supreme Court’s decision, Anish’s family alleged that justice had not been delivered and the grant of bail sent a wrong message to society.
Anish’s grandfather, Atmaram Awadhiya, told PTI Videos that the accused should not have been granted bail. Since the main accused belonged to a wealthy family, fraudulent means were adopted from the very beginning to protect the man, he alleged.
“It was such a major incident, and now bail has been granted,” he lamented.
Anish’s father, Omprakash Awadhiya, told PTI Videos that the three accused who were granted bail had tampered with blood samples to shield the main accused. “We want the bail to be cancelled for the sake of justice,” he said.
The Supreme Court on Monday granted bail to Aditya Sood, Ashish Mittal and Santosh Gaikwad, accused of aiding the tampering of blood samples after the accident, noting that they had been in jail for 18 months.
Sood (52) and Mittal (37) were arrested on August 19 last year, as their blood samples were used for tests in connection with two minors who were in the car along with the 17-year-old main accused at the time of the accident.
The Bombay High Court on December 16 last year rejected the bail pleas of eight accused, including Gaikwad, Sood and Mittal, in the case.
The Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) had granted bail to the minor accused on lenient terms, sparking nationwide outrage. The bail conditions included writing a 300-word essay on road safety.
As bail to the accused juvenile triggered outrage, the Pune police approached the JJB to review its decision. The board then modified the order and sent the juvenile to an observation home. In June, the high court ordered the release of the juvenile.
While the juvenile involved in the case was released from an observation home, 10 accused, including his parents Vishal Agarwal and Shivani Agarwal, doctors Ajay Tawre and Shreehari Halnor, Sassoon Hospital’s staffer Atul Ghatkamble, Sood, Mittal and Arun Kumar Singh, and two middlemen, were sent to jail in the blood sample swapping case.
Mittal is a friend of the main accused’s father, while Sood is the father of the boy who was seated on the rear seat of the car. Gaikwad is a middleman who had allegedly taken Rs 3 lakh to “manipulate” the blood report. PTI LAL OZ NSD NSD
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