Sheena Bora case: Rahul Mukerjea deposes in court for first time

MUMBAI: Chronicling events from 2008 until the moment he last saw his fiancee

Sheena Bora

on the evening of April 24, 2012, hours before she was allegedly murdered by her mother Indrani Mukerjea, Indrani's ex-husband Sanjeev Khanna and driver, on Thursday, Rahul Mukerjea, key witness in the case, deposed as the 69th prosecution witness for the first time before the special CBI court.

Rahul said when desperately looking for

Sheena

in the following days, his mother's friend helped him get in touch with former city police commissioner Param Bir Singh who advised him to file a missing person's complaint. He said the police did not take his complaints.

The 39-year-old Dehradun resident said until the murder came to light in 2015, not once did he suspect that she was killed. Drawing parallels with events from 2009 when attempts allegedly made by Indrani and others to separate Sheena and him, ended up with Sheena being sedated with what he suspected were antipsychotic medicines in Bengaluru, he said, "I suspected that something like 2009 may have happened to her."

Responding to questions posed by special public prosecutor, Manoj Chaladan, Rahul said on April 24, 2012, he had dropped Sheena at Bandra. She was to meet her mother Indrani. Rahul recalled seeing Indrani and driver Shyamvar Rai in a silver car and Khanna standing next to it, smoking. She walked towards the car. He said on April 25, 2012, he got a message from Sheena's phone saying she had met someone, he was very wealthy and she was in love with him. He said in 2011, Indrani and Sanjeev's daughter Vidhie sent Sheena a message saying, "Indrani is very angry and she wants to get rid of somebody." Special CBI judge SP Naik-Nimbalkar adjourned the hearing to June 17. Indrani told the court she would cross-examine Rahul.