New Delhi: A Special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in Mumbai Friday acquitted actor Sooraj Pancholi in the abetment to suicide case related to actor Jiah Khan’s death on 3 June, 2013.
Special judge A.S. Sayyad acquitted Pancholi due to “paucity of evidence”.
In 2013, 25-year-old Khan was found hanging at her Juhu home in Mumbai. Pancholi was booked for abetment to suicide after Khan’s mother, Rabia, told the police that her daughter died by suicide because of her relationship with Pancholi. She also handed over her daughter’s diary to the police which allegedly revealed that Khan was in a state of depression.
Pancholi was then arrested in June 2013, but released on bail by the Bombay High Court on 1 July 2013. Media reports said the CBI had filed a supplementary chargesheet in the case in 2015, charging him with abetment to suicide.
In January this year, the special court directed the CBI to expedite the trial by summoning the remaining witnesses against Pancholi. While the CBI had sought an adjournment at the time, Pancholi filed an application seeking expedited trial. He had alleged that the prosecution was delaying the case, and that only 19 witnesses had been examined so far, even though the case was pending since 2014.
“The prosecution is hereby directed to expedite the trial by calling the rest of the witnesses without fail,” the court had then ordered.
The prosecution examined 22 witnesses in the case.
Petitions for fresh probe
In March 2014, Khan’s mother Rabia approached the Bombay HC seeking fresh probe into the death of her daughter. In July that year, the high court had then directed the CBI to carry out further investigation and to consider whether this was a case of suicide or murder.
The court had ordered, “If it comes to a conclusion, that it is a homicidal death then, further investigation be made to find out who is the perpetrator of the crime and accordingly action be taken.”
In 2016, Rabia Khan again approached the Bombay HC, demanding formation of a special investigation team to conduct a fresh probe into her daughter’s death. She alleged that the investigation by the Juhu Police Station in Mumbai proceeded on the hypothesis that it was a case of suicide and did not consider the possibility of this being a murder case.
She also alleged that despite the high court’s July 2014 order, the CBI had also reached the same conclusion — that Jiah Khan’s death was a suicide.
The court, however, rejected her petition, observing, “Merely because CBI, an independent agency, like the State Investigation Agency of Police has arrived at the same conclusion, after its re-investigation or fresh investigation, that of ruling out the possibility of homicidal death and that the Petitioner is not satisfied with the same, it cannot be accepted that one more agency, like Special Investigation Team, should be again directed to carry out further investigation (sic).”
“Needless to state, that there would be no end to such exercise until the Petitioner gets the result of her choice,” it added.
(Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri)