Even though the court had already framed charges against two accused persons allegedly involved in the murder of Pushpa Sen, the sister of retired Supreme Court judge D.P. Wadhwa and they were in jail since April 2010, the Delhi high court, after finding sufficient evidence against them, dismissed their bail application on the ground that they had committed a gruesome act by murdering a 80-year-old woman, who was alone at the time of incident.
After hearing the arguments from Navin Sharma, the additional public prosecutor for the state, and the defence, Justice Hima Kohli dismissed the bail application of the accused duo, Rajkumar and Satish Pal alias Balbir, and observed, “The accused persons are not entitled for bail at this crucial stage seeing the gravity of their alleged crime.”
Mr Sharma told the court that the accused persons’ offence was heinous and the trial has just started. The recording of statements of several prosecution witnesses (PW) would start very soon, so granting of bail at this stage would hamper the deposition of these PWs.
The defence lawyer opposed the plea and argued that the accused were in jail since April last. The investigating agency has filed the chargesheet and the court has framed charges against them. So granting of bail would neither delay the deposition of statements of the PWs nor influence them in their testimony.
According to the prosecution, robbery was said to be the main motive behind the murder of Pushpa, a widow. The accused, Raj Kumar, 34, a tailor, allegedly entered into a criminal conspiracy with his accomplice, Satish Pal, 28, a plumber, and they had entered into her house on the intervening night of April 22, 2010 for the purpose of robbery and killed Pushpa who lived alone at her D-2, Vivek Vihar house.
She was brutally stabbed 37 times before being bludgeoned to death. Pushpa’s son and daughter are settled in the US.