SC gives bail to 'mentally ill' Maha woman who murdered her 2 children

NEW DELHI: Considering the acute mental illness she has been suffering from for years, SC Monday granted bail to one Pushpa Venaram Gujar who was accused of killing her four-year-old daughter and one-year-old son by slitting their throats at a Navi Mumbai locality of Thane district on Oct 30, 2022.

A bench of Justices Surya Kant and N Kotiswar Singh referred to reports of different psychiatrists who had been treating her and said, "There is an old history of the petitioner having mental ailment. Psychiatrists examined her in Aug 2023 and found that she had an acute tendency to withdraw from society, stop talking and eating and had to be force fed. She had attempted to strangulate herself twice as she is depressed, suspicious, fearful and talks in monosyllables. She was sent to Mumbai for treatment in Oct 2023 and a visiting psychiatrist opined that she be treated in company of her husband as she was stressed by his absence."

Commending the husband for coming forward with a promise to take her with him to her matrimonial home and continue her treatment, the bench chose from a list of hospitals for mentally ill patients given by Maharashtra govt and ordered that the man would take her regularly to for treatment.

Granting her bail and asking the trial court to attach "easy bail conditions", the bench said Bombay HC had erred by inferring exactly the opposite of what psychiatrists had consistently recommended and had denied bail to her by saying the husband's company would have an adverse impact on her.

On Oct 30, 2022, the 32-year-old woman had allegedly slit the throats of her two young children at her residence in Ghansoli in Thane when her husband was out for work. When he returned home, he found her sitting with the bodies of the two children. She had also slit her own wrist. Police had arrested her and sent her for treatment.