Sheena Bora murder case: Custody of all three accused extended

MUMBAI: The Bandra magistrate court has extended the police custody of Indrani Mukerjea, her ex-husband Sanjeev Khanna and her driver Shyram Rai to September 5. The developments came on a day when the Mumbai police filed an attempt to murder charge against the trio.

Public prosecutor Laxman Rathod told the court the police needed the three for interrogation as it was trying to figure out if people from outside the state were involved in the murder.

The police were yet to trace Sheena’s cell phone and clothes too. The prosecutor said that the police were trying to find out if the trio had tried to poison Indrani’s son Mikhail Bora and whether there was more to the motive for killing Sheena than inheriting her property.

Rathod told magistrate SM Chandagade that the cops were awaiting forensic analysis of the skull and other pieces of bone found in the Raigad forests to determine whether they were Sheena’s and also wanted to interrogate Indrani as to why she did not file a ‘missing person’ complaint.

Since the case was based on circumstantial evidence the police had to build a chain to link the evidence, the court was told.

Indrani’s and Khanna’s lawyers objected to the extension of police custody. Indrani’s lawyer Gunjan Mangla said that she was not allowed to meet her client privately and in the last 6days the cops had interrogated her client for almost 90 hours.

Mangla said that these violated her client’s fundamental rights. Amid arguments, Indrani fainted in court. When Indrani’s lawyer moved an application for home cooked food, the prosecution opposed it as it saw the possibility that she could be poisoned.