Trials of Truth

by Pinky Anand

  PINKY ANAND

  GAURI GOBURDHUN

  TRIALS OF TRUTH

  India’s Landmark Criminal Cases

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  CONTENTS

  1. For a Fistful of Rupees

  2. Women Who Kill

  3. A Twist of Fate: The Young Ones

  4. Bloodless Murder: Defamation

  5. Civil Society: A Champion of Justice

  6. In the Name of God: Terrorism

  7. Nanavati: The End of Jury Trials in India

  8. The Unafraid: We Called Her Nirbhaya

  9. The Butcher of Nithari

  10. Elected to Death

  11. The Tandoor Murder Case

  Author’s Note

  Notes

  Acknowledgements

  Follow Penguin

  Copyright

  I dedicate this book to the cause of justice

  1

  FOR A FISTFUL OF RUPEES

  The N.S. Jain murder case took the country by storm. As a young lawyer, it was the first trial I was attending at the Parliament Street district courts. The case was being tried by Ram Jethmalani, B.B. Lal and K.K. Luthra for the accused. I was fascinated. There was no direct evidence available. It was all about establishing links, typical to cases of contract killing. It was like fitting together the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.

  At the mention of contract killing, most people would instinctively think of trained professionals, slick and glamorous, in the style of James Bond, or the Jackal in Frederick Forsyth’s The Day of the Jackal. The reality often is that contract killers belong to the poor sections of the society, exploited by vengeful people who don’t want to dirty their hands and be nabbed for a crime. The problem with contract killing is that even if a trail is created, it is usually difficult to incarcerate the actual mastermind. Contract killers are ready to take on this risk for even a fistful of rupees, as little as Rs 500 at times. Organized-crime contract killing is slightly different; it is more gang-related and associated with violence around drug markets in large cities or trafficking transit zones in countries such as Brazil and Mexico. No matter the motivation, contract killers are emotionless, hard-hearted murderers who kill for cold, hard cash.

  Crime lore has somehow managed to romanticize the entire gruesome process and merge it with ideas of honour and daring, but at the end of the day, it is nothing but an agreement to conspire and kill.

  The entire process becomes a business transaction, instead of the emotionally fraught experience of actually committing a murder. Outsourcing the crime is always more beneficial for the hiring party, not only because they do not have to be directly involved, but also because it is difficult for law enforcement to employ traditional methods to determine guilt or motive, or establish circumstances. Often there is nothing to tie the contract killer to the victim and thus it becomes extremely difficult to link them. Simultaneously, the hirer can provide a watertight alibi for the time of murder and also ensure there is no visible money trail as all transactions are carried out in cash.

  All these reasons put together have resulted in killing for hire becoming an entire terrifying industry in itself.

  Over a period of time, contract killing has established itself as an expanding and growing business, with its own specific customs, sense of work ethic and norms such as anonymity and the importance of the reputations of the killers. Its dynamic base market, involving vast hosts of network and booming figures of supply and demand, has resulted in the creation of a massive nexus of nefarious intent and illicit activities. Single incidents are often indicative of an enormous operation that connects people across different spheres.

  History of Contract Killing in India

  Contract killing has been around as long as we can remember. Instances date back to when the kings or noblemen of the land used to hire killers to do their dirty work. During the 1960s and 1970s, the city of Bombay (now known as Mumbai) experienced the rise of the Indian underworld, the first-ever organized crime syndicate in the country. This notorious group of people and their lives have fed the fantasies of many a crime buff and made Dawood Ibrahim, Haji Mastan and Chhota Rajan household names.

  The first reported case of contract killing in India was in 1969. The smuggler Haji Mastan paid two Pakistani men what was then a princely sum of Rs 10,000 to eliminate the gangster Yusuf Patel. However, this attempt was aborted.

  Slowly, this set-up shifted to areas of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh since the Maharashtra police began conducting regular raids to eliminate these mafia power lords and sharpshooters. Unfortunately, in the former states, there were more people who could be easily convinced into being guns for hire due to the persistent poverty.

  The mafia employed these men to get rid of powerful personalities—mostly in the realm of politics, the Indian film industry, real estate—or anyone else. They would do this to scare people into paying money to these overlords. Thus began a system of terror.

  Another chilling case was the murder of the racketeer Amirzada Nawab Khan, carried out on the orders of Dawood Ibrahim. Khan was behind the murder of Dawood’s elder brother, who had been shot in broad daylight at the Mumbai sessions court; he had been murdered by a twenty-four-year-old unemployed man, David Pardesi, for the price of Rs 50,000.

  R.K. Sharma, an IPS officer, used to receive frequent visits from Shivani Bhatnagar in the Prime Minister’s Office to gather information regarding matters on which she was reporting. These frequent meetings developed into intimacy, frequent phone calls and meetings after office hours. It is alleged that the couple were deeply in love with each other and Shivani was pregnant with Sharma’s child. The relationship developed to such an extent that they decided to marry each other after divorcing their respective spouses.

  The story as reported by the media was that by the time Shivani gave birth to a male child, Sharma, the appellant, had already lost interest in her. She threatened to ruin his life and career by exposing him but paid for it with her life. The contract killer Pradeep Sharma was identified, but R.K. Sharma himself was acquitted. The Delhi High Court examined whether Pradeep Sharma had murdered Shivani Bhatnagar. However, it was observed that even if this fact were established, it would further have to be proved that it was at the behest of someone else that Pradeep had committed the offence and not of his own free will, in order to establish a criminal conspiracy. Appeals against the acquittal of R.K. Sharma have been filed by the state in the Supreme Court and are pending.

  One would imagine that in such situations, which involve the risk of incarceration and even the death penalty, the remuneration would be substantial. However, I have come across instances where some deals to commit murders are forged for as little as Rs 5000. While, on one hand, this reflects how morally depraved our society has become, on the other hand, it reveals some people’s strong need for survival. The lack of basic education, services and skill sets in India, combined with greed and the low regard for human life, has turned committing murders into a viable job option.

  A Pound of Flesh for Rs 25,000

  Narendra Singh Jain’s case marks the infamous 1973 contract killing of Mrs Vidya Jain. This case came to everyone’s attention possibly because both the killer and the deceased belonged to the upper echelons of society. Somehow, when a murder takes place among well-to-do people, it has a higher impact on the public. In this case, the accused was Dr N.S. Jain, the personal eye surgeon of the then Indian President, V.V. Giri, who hired two people to kill his forty-five-year-old wife in conspiracy with his paramour, Chandresh.

  The two questions that dominated the case were:

  Which of the two—Jain or Chandresh, or both—took the final call to kill Vidya?

  Did Jain really think that murder by
unknown assassins would not give rise to questions? Would it be believable that Vidya had been murdered for no reason?

  On 4 December 1973, Dr Jain came back to his house in the posh locality of Defence Colony in New Delhi at about 7.15 p.m. He asked his wife, Vidya Jain, to get ready so that they could visit his sister who lived in the same neighbourhood.

  They were to go in their car, which was parked the house next door. A few minutes later, the couple came out of the house. As Dr Jain walked towards the right side of the car to open its door, his wife proceeded towards the left. Before he could unlock the door, he noticed that his wife was nowhere to be seen. He went around to the left side of the car and saw a figure lying prostrate in the nearby drain. Just then a man jumped out of the drain, brandished a pistol at Dr Jain and ran away along with another man towards the north.

  Vidya’s body was found in the ditch from which the assailant had emerged. She was pulled out of the drain with the help of some guests of the Jains and their domestic help. Vidya had suffered fourteen brutal knife injuries. She was bleeding profusely, so Dr Jain put her in the car and drove to a nearby nursing home, where she was declared dead on arrival.

  A Meeting of Minds

  The plan to kill Vidya Jain was extremely complicated and riddled with hiccups. Dr Jain had a paramour called Chandresh Sharma whom he was intimately involved with while being married to his wife. Together, they wanted to kill Vidya so that they could continue their relationship in the open. Chandresh knew Rakesh Kaushik, a twenty-five-year-old man working as an education havildar, whom she approached. Around September 1973, Rakesh got in touch with a man called Karan Singh with the proposal to kill the doctor’s wife. Later, at another meeting, Chandresh accompanied Rakesh and gave Rs 1200 to Karan Singh and offered to pay Rs 20,000 for the entire operation, with Rs 10,000 given as an advance. On 14 September 1973, Chandresh took Rs 10,000 from her bag and gave them to Karan Singh. It is relevant that on the same day, Dr Jain withdrew Rs 10,000 in denominations of Rs 100. Karan Singh, however, invested the money in the purchase of a truck and never made an attempt on the life of Vidya Jain.

  The second time they decided to hire someone for the murder, Rakesh went to his home town of Charkhi Dadri in Haryana and brought back twenty-year-old Ram Kishan, a motor mechanic. Rakesh was also acquainted with a taxi driver called Ramji. In November 1973, Chandresh told Ramji that she needed his taxi as she had a plan to kill Dr Jain’s wife and had arranged for a man to commit the act on her behalf. She promised him a car as a gift and an opportunity of permanent employment in return. After Ramji agreed to provide the taxi, Rakesh started threatening and coercing Ram Kishan to kill Vidya Jain. It seems that till this point Ram Kishan was unaware as to why he had actually been brought to Delhi. Ram Kishan pretended to cooperate with the trio for a while. He was arranged to be in Vidya Jain’s proximity several times, but did not harm her. Ultimately, in December 1973, he concretely refused to kill her. Thus the second conspiracy to kill the doctor’s wife also did not reach fruition.

  Subsequently, Ramji took Rakesh and Ram Kishan to Kalyan Gupta. However, the chain of events and people did not end there. Ram Kishan was dropped at Bhogal in New Delhi, and Kalyan then took them to meet a man known as Bhagirath at the village of Ghori in Palwal district, Haryana. Bhagirath agreed to help them kill Vidya Jain and took them to Rajasthan to meet Ujagar Singh and Kartar Singh. A demand of Rs 25,000 was made by these two, which was readily agreed to.

  From then on, the team of Ujagar Singh and Kartar Singh scoped Dr Jain’s house several times.

  The principal conspirators, broadly speaking, were Dr Jain, Chandresh and Rakesh. Chandresh and Rakesh were actively involved, while Jain seemed to take a back seat and exercise control from behind the scenes. The details of the conspiracy were discussed and a plan hatched at a bustling restaurant called New Vig Restaurant in Chandni Chowk that Chandresh and Rakesh were known to frequent.

  On 4 December 1967, Rakesh, at about 4.30 p.m., asked Ramji to accompany him to ‘New Vig Restaurant’ as ‘the job’ had to be done that day. They hired a taxi and went to Chandni Chowk. Chandresh, Bhagirath, Kalyan, Ujagar and Kartar were already present outside the restaurant. They went inside, and while they were drinking coffee and eating Dr Jain arrived. He talked to Ujagar, cautioning him to execute the job carefully. He also assured him that he would get the amount he wanted and that the case would also be taken care of. After Dr Jain left, Chandresh told the other conspirators that she would also be reaching Dr Jain’s house in the doctor’s car at about 6.30 p.m. She informed them that she would get down from the car outside the house, and instructed them that when the doctor emerged from the house along with his wife, Ujagar and Kartar were to kill her. She asked them to ensure that the doctor did not suffer any injury. From the restaurant, Ramji, Bhagirath and Kalyan left for Bhogal in a taxi and reached Defence Colony at about 5.45 p.m. Bhagirath and Kalyan went to the latter’s house while Ramji returned to his jhuggi. The plan was executed later the very same evening.

  No plan to commit a crime is ever foolproof. This case had several subplots, some of which failed. However, even though the final stages were meticulously planned, certain glaring features pointed the investigating agencies to Jain and Chandresh:

  Robbery was not the motive. Nothing was stolen.

  The crime was pre-planned.

  Why was Dr Jain not attacked?

  Why did Dr Jain not attempt to pursue the assailants? Why was he a mute spectator?

  All these incriminating circumstances, coupled with the disclosure statement of Chandresh and Ujagar, concurrently pointed towards the guilt of Dr Jain.

  When the police investigated, they found that Chandresh Sharma had been his secretary, whom he had fired to maintain peace at home. Chandresh was given a house by Dr Jain and regular cheques higher than her salary as his secretary were deposited in her account. It was established in court that Dr Jain and Chandresh wanted to marry each other and, therefore, conspired together to kill Vidya.

  The trial court charged Dr N.S. Jain, Chandresh Sharma, Rakesh Kaushik, Bhagirath, Kalyan Gupta, Kartar Singh and Ujagar Singh under Section 120B of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (IPC), for having entered into a conspiracy along with Ramji, the approver, to commit the murder of Vidya Jain and for murder.

  Kartar and Ujagar were tried separately under Section 27 of the Arms Act for possession of the pistol and cartridges as also for the knife recovered from them. The sessions judge found Kalyan Gupta and Bhagirath guilty only for conspiracy while the rest were found guilty of all the charges against them and sentenced to imprisonment for life. Kartar and Ujagar were also sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for two years and one year respectively under Section 27 of the Arms Act.

  Since there was only circumstantial evidence leading up to the event, the prosecution’s task was a tough one. However, the prosecution, through the help of unprecedented efficient investigation and intrepid witnesses, established the convoluted chain of circumstantial evidence. Appeals were filed by the accused and cross appeals by the state for enhancement of the sentence.

  This case is treated as a landmark for its exposition on circumstantial evidence as we all still seem to rely heavily on direct eyewitness accounts and motive. It was a complex conspiracy with myriad actors. Interestingly, all were convicted; the doers and the bystanders. This trial is also historic for the stand the defence lawyers took in admitting the affair. It is rare for defence lawyers to admit anything directly or indirectly incriminating.

  The Motive

  Mr A.N. Mulla, counsel for Chandresh, and Mr B.B. Lal, counsel for Dr Jain, correctly proceeded with the stratagem to not deny the affair between Dr Jain and Chandresh, the latter obtaining a decree of judicial separation from her husband and the flow of money by way of cheques and bank drafts from Dr Jain to Chandresh as proved by the prosecution. But motive to murder was denied. Counsel for Dr Jain contended, ‘There was no earthly reason for Dr Jain to develop a devastating desire to marry Cha
ndresh after their liaison had brought him all the desired gratification over so many years.’ The contention was that Dr Jain had no motive whatsoever for having Vidya Jain killed.

  Mr Mulla urged with equal vehemence that Chandresh also lacked motive to murder Vidya Jain and submitted that Vidya Jain’s resentment and opposition to the intimacy between Dr Jain and Chandresh began as far back as April 1967, but Chandresh never did anything to harm Vidya Jain by way of retaliation or revenge. He contended, ‘Nothing new having occurred to aggravate the hostility on Chandresh’s part [if any], there could be no “compelling motive” for her to get Vidya Jain slain.’

  The Delhi High Court observed:

  ‘It is now well-settled that where direct evidence of commission of the crime is creditable, motive recedes into the background and is not accorded much importance. However, in a case depending wholly on circumstantial evidence motive is one of the material factors calling for consideration.

  Not that an accused can be convicted merely on the proof of motive, but it certainly helps in the appreciation of the evidence bearing on the offence charged. Now, it may be possible to prove motive in one case while in another case no evidence thereof may be forthcoming. Its remaining shrouded in mystery would not, however, necessarily mean positive absence of motive. It is again beyond the pale of controversy that the prosecution need not make out adequacy of motive. How different persons behave in and react to diverse circumstances is incapable of prediction. What may appear to one as a very minor matter, to another may strike as grave enough for committing the most heinous crime. It would thus suffice for the prosecution to lead evidence suggesting a motive and leave the matter at that.