Aarushi Talwar verdict: Trial judge 'acted like film director'

From holding that the trial court judge, who had sentenced Rajesh and Nupur Talwar for the murder of Aarushi Talwar and Hemraj, had acted like a "film director" and had "prejudged things" and had "tried to thrust coherence amongst facts inalienably scattered here and there but not giving any coherence to the idea as to what in fact happened", the Allahabad High Court's yesterday's judgment, acquitting the couple in the sensational case, is also a damning indictment of the trial court.

The trial court had held the Talwar couple guilty and awarded rigorous life imprisonment to both for the murders.

Debunking the propositions of the Central Bureau of Investigation, the bench comprising Justices Bala Krishna Narayana and Arvind Kumar Mishra wrote concurring judgements with two separate conclusions.

In his conclusion, Justice Mishra concurred with Justice Narayana but further observed that "some reflection needs to be made upon the style and approach of the trial judge who recorded conviction and awarded sentence against the appellants (SIC)."

"The learned trial Judge has prejudged things in his own fashion, drawn conclusion by embarking on erroneous analogy conjecturing to the brim on apparent facts telling a different story propelled by vitriolic reasoning (sic)," the court order said.

In another scathing observation, Justice Mishra said, "... Thus, basing the finding of conviction without caring to see that it being a case based on circumstantial evidence things cannot be presumed and stuffed in a manner like the present one by adhering to self-created postulates then to roam inside the circle with all fanciful whims. The learned trial Judge took evidence and the circumstances of the case for granted and tried to solve it like a mathematical puzzle when one solves a given question and then takes something for granted in order to solve that puzzle and question."

In the more than 200-paged judgment, the high court judges noted that a trial court judge "cannot act like a maths teacher who is solving a mathematical question by analogy after taking certain figure for granted", adding,"That way, the learned trial judge has aberrated and by dint of fallacious analogy and reasoning has surprisingly assumed fictional animation of the incident as to what actually took place inside and outside the Flat L 32 Jalvayu Vihar, and in what manner he has tried to give live and colourful description of the incident in question."