On September 30, Leena Devasthali, 59, and her daughter Deepti, 29, were acquitted of murder charge, but were held guilty of kidnapping for ransom, criminal conspiracy and cheating by impersonation.
One of the reasons that got the Pune mother-daughter duo acquitted of murder was the fact that the prosecution could not prove that the recovered disfigured body parts belonged to Deepak Mahajan, the doctor who got killed. The mother and daughter were accused of allegedly kidnapping and murdering Mahajan by hacking his body in July 2006.
In a 146-page judgment, made public on Tuesday, the Bombay high court noted a number of instances of shoddy investigations by the police, and held that the DNA report matching the body with the samples, sent by the police, was “unreliable”.
On September 30, Leena Devasthali, 59, and her daughter Deepti, 29, were acquitted of murder charge, but were held guilty of kidnapping for ransom, criminal conspiracy, cheating by impersonation and other sections of the Indian Penal Code and were sentenced for life imprisonment.
Two DNA tests were carried out by Kalina’s forensic science laboratory, one of which showed the result negative, while the other showed it positive. “We will be committing an error if we accept two conflicting DNA reports,” said justice JN Patel and justice Mridula Bhatkar.
The prosecution had heavily relied on the “last seen together” theory which states that if the accused were last seen together, there lies a presumption that the accused murdered Mahajan. The prosecution contended that Mahajan was taken to the room at Uttamnagar and in that room the two women killed him and dismembered his body.
“The prosecution could not solve a mystery of five days as to what happened to Dr Deepak Mahajan, after he was abducted. When and where he was killed? It only demonstrates improper and ineffective investigation on behalf of the state on this crucial aspect,” the judges observed.
While the court accepted the prosecution’s case that the chemical Thipentone was administered on Mahajan to make him unconscious before he was abducted, the prosecution “is absolutely silent” on what happened to the doctor afterwards, the court said.
The court also noted the absence of a motive in the case. While the trial court had considered the demand of ransom amount of Rs25 lakh as the motive, there was no repetition of the demand.
The court also criticised the trial court for recording the evidence of Dr Malini from Bangalore forensic science laboratory who conducted the narco-analysis despite the evidence being inadmissible.
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