CBI reconstitutes team probing Aarushi murder case

NEW DELHI: After failing to make any breakthrough in the sensational Aarushi-Hemraj murder case, the CBI has reconstituted its team of officials to go into the double murder.

A decision to this effect was taken by CBI chief Ashwani Kumar as he did not agree with the line of investigation taken by the team, sources in the agency said.

CBI officials maintain that the decision was taken because the present director believed that there should be complete decentralisation of the cases and this case should be investigated by CBI sleuths in Lucknow.

The new team was likely to start investigation right from scratch as now even the vaginal swab of 14-year-old Aarushi seems to have been misplaced or not taken at all.

They said there was no semen, as alleged initially, in the slides sent to the centre and corroborative testing revealed that the material was not drawn from Aarushi.

Sunil Dohere, a doctor, had taken vaginal swabs following Aarushi's murder on May 15, 2008. The doctor reported that the swabs contained a white discharge, suggestive of seminal fluid.

But, Dohere's senior, S C Singhal, later said the slides prepared from the swabs had tested negative for semen.

Aarushi was found murdered in her Noida home on May 15, 2008. Their domestic help Hemraj, initially suspected of the crime, was later found dead on the roof-top.