A special CBI court on Friday rejected the bail application of Indrani Mukherjea, the key accused in the Sheena Bora murder case, after dismissing her claims about her “ill-health” and the threat to her life in the prison as “exaggerated and unacceptable”.
While hearing her bail plea on the grounds of “ill-health” and alleged threat to her life, CBI Judge JC Jagdale said that Indrani was much safer inside the prison than outside, while he said that the accused had also made a similar claim when she had applied for bail in 2016.
Indrani, who has been lodged at Byculla women prison ever since she was arrested in August 2015 for the murder of her daughter Sheena Bora, had applied for bail mid last month, citing “ill-health” and threat to her life. While citing two instances of her hospitalisation for drug overdose, she had alleged that someone in the prison was trying to “poison” her.
While rejecting Indrani’s bail plea, the Judge said that Indrani was exaggerating the issue and said that, as per the prison authorities, she had been given adequate security by lodging her in a separate cell where she was under round-the-clock CCTV surveillance. “If the present prison cell is not adequate, then the authorities are at liberty to shift her to a different cell or provide further security in the present cell,” the Judge said.
Alluding to Indrani’s hospitalisation, the CBI had argued that the court that the accused interacted with fellow inmates in the court after hearings and one of them might have given her the pills which caused the illness and that the jail authorities and doctors at the State-run JJ Hospital could provide her adequate medical care. The agency had also informed the court that Indrani’s health was fine and that she was being given necessary treatment whenever required.
While not lending much of credence to the claim of “ill-health” made by the accused, the Judge noted that she had also cited similar health reasons when she had applied for bail in 2016.
On its part, the CBI had told the court that releasing Indrani on the two un-founded grounds would be prejudicial to the Prosecution's case.
Indrani -- wife of Peter Mukherjea-- was arrested on August 25, 2015 for her alleged role in the murder of Sheena Bora, her daughter from her first marriage with Siddharth Das. A day later, Indrani's subsequent live-in partner Sanjeev Khanna was arrested from Kolkata. Later on September 29, 2015, Indrani’s husband Peter Mukherjea was arrested.
The Prosecution’s case is that Indrani and other two arrested accused – Sanjeev and Rai – had allegedly “kidnapped” Sheena between 6.30 pm and 7.30 pm on April 24, 2012, from Bandra (west) in their car. She was allegedly strangulated in the car on the same evening and that on the following morning they carried the body of the deceased packed in a bag (which had they kept in the rear side of the +car) to the jungles Gogade Khurd village off the Khopoli-Pen Road, where they doused the bag with petrol and set it on fire.
Sheena was daughter of Indrani from her first husband Siddhartha Das. Incidentally, Sheena had been in a live-in relationship with Rahul Mukerjea, son of Peter Mukherjea – a fact that both Indrani and Peter had not approved of.
With Rai having been made an approver, there are three accused in the case –Indrani Mukherjea, her current husband Peter Mukherjea and her earlier husband Sanjeev Khanna.