“Suspicion, however grave it may be, cannot take the place of proof,” the Allahabad High Court noted as it debunked the findings of the CBI and acquitted the Talwar couple in the murder of their daughter, Aarushi, and domestic help Hemraj.
In their 273-page judgment, Justices B.K. Narayana and A.K. Mishra thrashed the investigating agency’s reasoning on several counts, while making stinging observations on the CBI special judge S.Lal’s verdict of 2013.
As against the CBI’s contention that only the Talwar couple could have committed the crime since they were present at home that night, the court said the “possibility of the presence” of other persons and outsiders in the family’s flat in Noida on the fateful night in 2008 “cannot be ruled out”.
“There was clinching evidence on record which pointed to the presence of outsiders in the flat of the Talwars,” Justice Narayana said.
“Clear and credible evidence of alternative hypothesis available on record substantially demolishes the prosecution’s theory.”
Justice Mishra concurred with his colleague’s conclusions.
Miserable failure
The Division Bench said the CBI had miserably failed to lead any evidence which may even remotely suggest that Hemraj was murdered in the Aarushi’s bedroom and his body was then wrapped in a bed sheet and dragged up to the terrace.
The court said the CBI’s theory that the Talwars had hidden Hemraj’s body on the terrace was “patently absurd and improbable”.
“We have no hesitation in holding that the prosecution has failed to prove by any reliable or cogent evidence”, the motive suggested by it for the Talwars to “commit the double murder, i.e. the deceased [Aarushi] being caught in the midst of a sexual act” by her father, the High Court said.
The delayed discovery of Hemraj’s body a day after Aarushi was found dead “was not on account of any act of omission” of the Talwars, but a result of “negligence and shoddy investigation” by the Noida police. “There is no evidence” that the Talwars or any of their relatives “tried to prevent or obstruct” the police officers from breaking open the lock of the terrace on May 16, 2008.
The CBI failed to prove its case beyond all reasonable doubts, the court said, observing that the chain of circumstances presented by the agency was “grossly incomplete and broken”.
