Shivani Bhatnagar murder: Former top cop acquitted

NEW DELHI: In a stunning reversal of fortune in the Shivani Bhatnagar case, dismissed IPS officer Ravi Kant Sharma was on Wednesday acquitted by the Delhi high court of the charge of plotting her murder. He has already spent over nine years in jail. At 8.35pm on Wednesday, he walked out free from Tihar and was driven away by his wife and younger daughter who refused to speak to waiting reporters.
"The quality of evidence before us is not of a high calibre," said the court. "The key document, Ex.PW135/28 (call records), is riddled with so many problems that it cannot be relied upon. Judges, like other human beings, also have suspicions, but judges, unlike others who are free to arrive at their own conclusions, cannot and do not convict on the basis of mere suspicion," it observed in its 84-page order. A division bench, comprising Justice B D Ahmed and Justice Manmohan Singh, said the prosecution had failed to link Sharma to the crime and had not proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.
However, the court confirmed the conviction of Pradeep Sharma—who, according to the prosecution was a hired killer—for actually killing Shivani. Others acquitted include Sri Bhawgan Sharma and Satya Prakash as they were given benefit of doubt by HC.
The court faulted the prosecution for failure to establish the link between R K Sharma and the killer since the crucial records relating to the call details were tampered with and had to be discarded. "Once the link between Pradeep Sharma and the other appellants, insofar as the crime is concerned, is snapped, there is serious doubt about the involvement of the others," the judges held, observing that the motive of the killing was "unclear".
"Although the motive behind Pradeep Sharma killing Shivani Bhatnagar is unclear and has not been established, we have already found, on the basis of other overwhelming scientific and circumstantial evidence, that Pradeep Sharma was the person who killed Shivani Bhatnagar," the bench said.
It was aware that many questions remained unanswered. "Did he (Pradeep Sharma) act alone? Did he act at the behest of R K Sharma and the other appellants or did he act at the instance of someone else? These are questions which we cannot answer on the basis of the material before us," said the bench. It rejected the claim of the prosecution that four phone calls were made between the accused on January 23, the day the journalist was strangled and stabbed several times on her neck and that this established their complicity in the offence.
"We are of the view that PW 135/28 is not a direct computer printout of the data available in the computers or servers of the telephone company. The impression we get is that the data has been tampered with," the court said. "Certain details have been blanked out and others have been introduced. The date sequence and time sequence have been altered."
Once the most crucial evidence linking the killer to other accused failed to pass muster before HC, it discarded other circumstantial evidence cited by the prosecution. Important among these was the claim of the prosecution that Shivani was eliminated at the instance of R K Sharma, then director, vigilance, Air India, as he wanted to get out of their "full-blown love affair".
Shivani had threatened Sharma that she would expose him, the prosecution argued, adding that it amply established the motive behind the murder which was supported by the call details of Shivani's landline phone and the mobile phone of the IPS officer. The prosecution had cited the statement of Shivani's friend, Saijal Shah, that R K Sharma, when he was OSD at the PMO, had visited Shivani in London where she was pursuing a course.
The journalist was also in possession of certain classified documents and had threatened she would expose the IPS officer by making them public, the prosecutor had alleged. The lukewarm response of the IPS officer to the birth of Shivani's child allegedly irked her and she threatened to ruin the life and career of Sharma. As a result, he hatched the conspiracy to kill her, it claimed.
The court said it was not sure who had manipulated the call records. "On the basis of available evidence, we cannot determine as to which part of exhibit PW 135/28 is authentic and which part isn't. We are also not clear as to whether tampering was done at the instance of R K Sharma, who was a powerful police officer, or at the instance of someone else," it said.
The bench also upheld the acquittal of two co-accused, Ved Prakash Sharma and Ved Prakash alias Kalu, by the trial court.