Aarushi-Hemraj Murder Case: Supreme Court agrees to hear appeals against Talwars' acquittal

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear the Central Bureau of Investigation's (CBI) appeal challenging the acquittal of Rajesh and Nupur Talwar in the 2008 twin murder case of their daughter Aarushi and domestic help Hemraj.

CBI’s appeal along with Hemraj’s wife’s long-pending petition would be heard by a bench headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi.

The CBI has also challenged the acquittal of the Talwars by the Allahabad High Court on October 12, 2017.               

The Supreme Court bench comprising Justices Navin Sinha and K M Joseph has granted leaves.

Additional Solicitor General Maninder Singh, who is representing the CBI, attributed to the plea filed by Hemraj’s wife, listening to which the bench said the probe agency’s appeal would be tagged with it.

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Fourteen-year-old Aarushi Talwar was found dead inside her room, with her throat slit, at Talwar residence at Noida in May 2008. The body of the first murder suspect, Hemraj, was recovered from the terrace of the house two days later.

The then Chief Minister Mayawati had recommended a CBI probe into the matter. The case was subsequently handed over to the agency. The Talwars were later sentenced to life imprisonment on November 26, 2013, by the verdict passed by a CBI court at Ghaziabad in connection with the case.

However, the High Court later released them of the charges on the ground that they could not be held guilty on the basis of the evidence on record.

On March 8, the CBI moved the apex court challenging the Allahabad high court verdict, months after Hemraj’s wife, Khumkala Banjade, had on December 15, 2017, approached the top court against the verdict of October 12, 2017, on the basis on the evidence on record.

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On February 9, retired special CBI judge Shyam Lal, who had earlier convicted the Talwar couple in 2013, also moved the apex court against the high court judgement expunction of certain observations. He mentioned that the criticism held against him in the Allahabad High Court verdict was ‘disparaging’ and ‘unwarranted’.

The high court verdict blamed the trial judge for taking the evidence and circumstances of the case for granted and also said it tried to solve it like a “mathematical puzzle when one solves a given question and then takes something for granted in order to solve that puzzle and question”. It also added that “the trial judge cannot act like a maths teacher who is solving a mathematical question by analogy after taking the certain figure for granted”.

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Ambushed by the criticism, the retired judge had filed a plea against the high court verdict, saying that strictures passed against him were ultimately going to affect his reputation as an impartial and transparent judge and should be expunged.

(With PTI inputs)

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