Geetika’s case: police again fail to get Aruna’s custody

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A Delhi court on Tuesday once again rejected the plea of investigators to get the custody of Aruna Chaddha to confront her with former Haryana Minister and key accused in Geetika Sharma suicide case saying they failed to give fresh and cogent reasons for her custodial interrogation.

“The Investigating Officer has failed to disclose any fresh and cogent reason for grant of further police custody remand of accused Aruna Chaddha.

“The facts and circumstances and material brought on record does not warrant grant of police custody remand at this stage,” Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate D K Jangala said.

The fresh plea of the Delhi Police was rejected a day after a Magisterial court yesterday refused them custodial interrogation of Chaddha to confront her with Kanda and the documents recovered at the behest of the former Haryana Minister after his arrest and custodial interrogation.

40-year-old Chaddha was remanded in 14-day judicial custody on August 16.

Meanwhile, the court objected to Geetika’s postmortem report being leaked to the media and directed the Joint Commissioner of Police (northern range) to inquire into it.

“It has come to the notice of this court that the findings of the postmortem report of deceased Geetika Sharma, which was very personal in nature, has been published by the media despite stated to be in a sealed cover by the IO,” the court said.

“Such type of publication interferes in administration of justice. Therefore, I direct the Joint Commissioner of Police (northern range) to ensure that in future any such type of report does not leak to anyone.

“Jt CP (northern range) is directed to conduct an inquiry regarding the leak of this report to the media and file his report within 7 days in this court,” the court ordered.

Earlier, during the arguments, the police had said Chaddha was to be confronted with Kanda and certain documents which could be recovered only after his arrest.

Additional Public Prosecutor Rajiv Mohan told the court that during her custodial interrogation, Chaddha had lied about her date of joining MDLR company.

“Chaddha had disclosed that she had joined the company only a month prior to Geetika joining it while it has now been discovered that she had joined much earlier,” he said.

The court, however, said “no contardictory facts between Chaddha’s disclosure statement and new facts discovered have been brought to its knowledge.”

The police also said the e-mail sent to Geetika intimating her about extradition proceedings against her in Dubai was drafted by Chaddha and sent to Geetika by another MDLR employee named Shivroop.

“Probe and raid at MDLR office revealed the extradition mail was sent by an e-mail ID created in the name of one Al Bashir, purportedly an Emirates Airline employee.

However, a probe has brought out that Assisstant Manager at MDLR, Shivroop, had created fake mail ID in the name of Al Bashir. Shivroop, during his questioning, said Chaddha had drafted that extradition mail and he mailed it to Geetika,” the prosecutor said.

He also said Kanda had purchased a land in the name of Geetika’s father but later cancelled it.

The police also said “a bunch of documents recovered from MDLR office showed that a company by the name of ‘Aromafoods’ was opened in the name of Chaddha and her father and the same was later rechristened AKG, referring to Aruna, Geetika and another employee named Khushboo.”

Chaddha’s counsel Kapil Singla rebutted the police arguments saying his client has already “suffered” eight days of interrogation.

“The police have not even mentioned the grounds clearly for which they again want the police custody,” he said.

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