Ghaziabad: The special CBI court in Ghaziabad on Wednesday rejected the plea of dentist couple Rajesh and Nupur Talwar for 10-day adjournment for recording their statements in connection with the murder trial of their daughter Aarushi and domestic servant Hemraj.
In their plea, Rajesh and Nupur had sought the adjournment on the ground that they had to approach the Supreme Court with a Special Leave Petition seeking deposition 14 persons as court witnesses, including Arun Kumar, who was Joint Director of the CBI in 2008 and led the initial probe in the sensational double murder.
Judge Shyam Lal directed their counsel to start deposition of the couple under section 313 of the criminal procedure code from May 10 onwards which has been fixed as next date of the trial. Talwars, who are out on bail, are bring tried for allegedly murdering their 14-year old daughter and domestic servant whose bodies were found from the bedroom and terrace of their Jalvayu Vihar residence respectively on May 16, 2008.
During the last hearing on May 4, the judge had rejected Talwars' plea seeking testimony of Kumar along with 13 others as court witnesses. The court had said that prosecution can choose the witnesses it wants to produce and if defence felt that some other witnesses are needed in the trial they can produce them as defence witnesses.
Posted at present as Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order), Kumar, a 1985 batch IPS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre, had probed the case from June 2008 to April 2009 and arrested three servants of Talwar and their friends.
However, the investigation carried out by the team led by him and his role along with his former boss and the then CBI Director Vijay Shanker came under criticism from courts. Kumar's probe had led to the three servants - Krishna, Rajkumar and Vijay Mandal - being lodged in jail for three months while he had given a clean chit to the parents.
A fresh team was instituted which carried out the investigation in the case and filed a closure report, ruling out the invovement of these servants. Kumar was also repatriated to his parent cadre. The closure report filed by CBI indicated alleged involvement of Talwar couple in the double murder on the basis of circumstantial evidence gathered by it during the probe.
Talwars also demanded deposition as court witness of Dr Richa Saxena, a pathologist who is said to have taken the samples of vaginal swabs from Aarushi's body but the evidence got mixed up. Other persons include inspectors, sub-inspectors of the CBI who were part of the prosecution witness list but were not called for deposition before the court.
Aarushi was found dead with her throat slit in her bedroom on May 16, 2008. The initial suspicion went on Hemraj whose body was later found in the their terrace at Jalvayu Vihar in Noida on the outskirts of Delhi. The allegations of involvement in the murder have been refuted by the Talwars who have claimed innocence in the case.
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