The Mumbai Police said here on Saturday that the car in which Sheena Bora was murdered allegedly by former INX Media CEO Indrani Mukherjea, along with her ex-husband Sanjeev Khanna and her driver Shyamvar Pinturam Rai, three years ago had been traced.
“It was in the car Sheena was strangulated to death and the body, stuffed in a suitcase, taken to Raigad and dumped after burning. What we can confirm is that the owner is in Mumbai and we are in touch with him,” said a senior police officer.
Attributing to the revelations made by the three accused, the officer said the driver, though an accomplice in the crime, had driven the vehicle while the strangulation in the moving car was carried out by Indrani and Sanjeev. The murder, according to the police, happened within the city limits of Mumbai.
It is likely that the accused trio would be taken to the spot in Raigad on Sunday.
The police are also verifying the allegations made by Sheena’s brother Mikhail Bora that Ms. Mukherjea, his mother, had spiked his drinks on the day of the murder and was making him consume drugs which could potentially leave him mentally ill.
Mikhail, who was in Mumbai on the day of the murder and had been flown in from Guwahati by the police now, was being questioned again, said sources.
Regarding the murder, the officer clarified that Mikhail was not privy to his mother’s plans but did not divulge the reasons why he was then called just before the alleged murder. The officer also said that there was no evidence to suggest that Mikhail had sent Sheena’s resignation letter or was maintaining her LinkedIn account after her death.
“That was done by someone else at Ms. Mukherjea’s behest. We have already recorded the statement,” said the officer. Sources confirmed that the person is a woman.
The police also said that they could call Ms. Mukherjea’s current husband, former Star CEO Peter Mukherjea, again to record a detailed statement. Asked about the contents of Mr. Peter Mukherjea’s submission on Friday, the officer said that he had only provided them a copy of his passport thus establishing that he was in Rome at the time of Sheena’s murder.
On Mr. Mukherjea’s son Rahul, who was engaged to Sheena and was one of the last persons apart from the accused trio to see her alive, the officer said Rahul had confronted Ms. Mukherjea on her claim that Sheena was in the U.S., but was told that she had left India using a “second passport.”
Sheena’s passport was recovered by the police from his maternal uncle’s family in Dehradun on Friday, raising questions on Rahul’s complicity in the killing.
PTI adds...
Village official helps locate burial spot
The Mumbai police team has a lot to thank Ganesh Dhene, a village official in Pen tehsil of Raigad district, for helping them locate the spot where Sheena was allegedly buried in 2012.
A team of police, forensic experts and villagers had on Friday exhumed the skeletal remains after Dhene, a Police Patil, identified the exact spot.
As per the Bombay Village Police Act, a Police Patil is directly subordinate to the Police department and the taluka magistrate.
In case a crime is committed in the limits of village, he makes immediate report to the police station and renders necessary help to the police officer to detect the offender.
“We have recovered skeletal remains of Sheena Bora. We will be dispatching the remains for a DNA test,” Mumbai Police Commissioner Rakesh Maria had said on Friday
A Timeline of events:
April 24, 2012: Sheena Bora takes a leave of absence from work at Mumbai Metro. On the same day she sends a resignation letter to her employer. She is not heard from again. No missing complaint is ever lodged by any family member.
May 23, 2012: Police find a decomposed body after villagers at Gagode in Pen tehsil, Maharashtra, complain of foul odour.
August 21, 2015: Shyamvar Pinturam Rai is arrested following the seizure of a 7.63-bore pistol from him.
August 26, 2015: Indrani opened up that Sheena was her daughter from a previous marriage and not sister as maintained.
August 27, 2015: Sanjeev Khanna, a Kolkata based businessman and ex-husband of Indrani Mukherjea was arrested from Kolkata.
Aug 27, 2015: Sheena Shyam Rai, Indrani's driver, confessed that he murdered Sheena and disposed of her body, on the direction of his employer Indrani Mukherjea.
Aug 28, 2015: Sanjeev Khanna confessed to his "complicity in the crime." He had earlier said that, Sheena’s body was lying next to him in a car in which they were travelling together in Mumbai on April 24, 2012.
Aug 29, 2015: Maharashtra Police has ordered a probe into why the Raigad Police did not register an Accidental Death Report (ADR) after they found a burnt corpse, suspected to be of Sheena Bora, in 2012.
