Sheena Bora murder case: CBI court defers cross-examination of police officer

Mumbai: All three accused in Sheena Bora murder case, including former media honcho Peter Mukerjea and his wife Indrani, were allowed by a CBI court to defer their cross-examination of a police officer in the case. The special CBI court allowed the trio to defer their cross-examination on a plea made by them earlier on 4 July. [caption id=“attachment_2417980” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File image of Indrani and Peter Mukerjea. CNN-News18[/caption] The trio had sought court’s permission to defer the cross-examination of Sub Inspector Ganesh Dalvi, who had deposed before the court in connection with the arrest of Shyamwar Rai, driver of key accused Indrani Mukerjea, in an arms case. Dalvi, the first witness to depose in the case, had arrested Rai in connection with Arms Act case and during his interrogation in that case, the driver had blew the lid off Sheena Bora’s murder. On 4 July, the defence lawyers had moved an application seeking to cross-examine Dalvi only after the examination of Rai. The CBI had objected to the plea saying the deferment of the cross-examination of the police officer by the accused would delay the trial. “It is a general practice that if there is an approver in a case, he is brought as the first witness,” defence counsel Shrikant Shivde, appearing for Peter Mukerjea, had argued in the application, referring to Sub-Inspector Dalvi’s deposition prior to Rai in the case. “Here we need to confront omission or/and contradictions of Rai with Dalvi’s (during cross-examination),” Shivde had said. Meanwhile, Indrani filed an application in the court, seeking its permission to sign a special power of attorney in the name of one T Ramkrishna for leasing her property situated in Phoenix. Peter too has moved an application seeking access to the case diary from Khar police station. Key accused Indrani, her husband Peter and former husband Sanjeev Khanna have been accused of conspiracy and murder of Sheena Bora, Indrani’s daughter from an earlier relationship. While Sheena was killed on 24 April 2012, the case came to light only in 2015 after Indrani’s driver Shyamwar Rai was arrested in another case. Rai was also arrested in the murder case but he turned an approver last year. All the three accused — Peter, Indrani and Sanjeev — are in judicial custody.