He will be released after applying for release before the trial court and fixing the bail amount and completing the formalities.
Her lawyer Sana Rais Khan said she would try to apply for release on Friday.
The SC bench of Justices L Nageswara Rao and Bhushan Gavai said that six-and-a-half years was a long time in which around 200 witnesses are yet to be heard.
The top court said the conditions of bail should be similar to those given earlier by the Bombay High Court to co-accused Peter Mukerjea. He was granted bail on a surety of Rs 2 lakh.
Mukherjee had filed a special leave petition (SLP) against the Bombay High Court’s November 16 order rejecting his bail in the case. He was arrested by Mumbai Police on 25 August 2015 and is behind bars since then.
The HC single judge bench of Justice Nitin Sambre, while dismissing his bail plea on merit, had said, “There is sufficient material on record to presuppose prima facie involvement of the applicant in the offence.”
On Wednesday, after hearing senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi and counsel Sana Rais Khan appearing for him, the Supreme Court granted him bail.
He argued that he was imprisoned for six and a half years. Sixty-eight of the 237 prosecution witnesses were examined and 185 are yet to be examined.
His counsel submitted that the special trial court is vacant since June 7, 2021. The reason for his stay in jail for so long was also argued and considered by the top court.
Mukherjee, in his plea, had said “there is no conclusive evidence against him to support the case of the prosecution”.
They argued that the case of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) rests on the story of the approver, “lacking substantive evidence” and the identification of the body discovered at Penn on May 25, 2012 and the cause of death. The prosecution’s identity as to the body of Sheena Bora is yet to be traced.
This has been confirmed by medical and forensic experts and their reports. Apart from the skeleton excavated on August 28, 2015, the forensic evidence alleged by Khar police to be Sheena does not amount to forensic evidence as the skulls in the two are different, while the 2012 skull was uncovered, the 2015 skull ‘intact’. ‘ Was.
Further, the SLP also said, “No DNA profiling was done to establish the identity of the body discovered in May 2012, which was alleged by the prosecution as the body of Sheena Bora.”
“SMS records obtained by DFSL from mobile phone of prosecution witness Rahul Mukerjea reveal an intimate conversation between Rahul Mukherjee and Sheena Bora for more than a week in September 2012, five months after the alleged murder”, says the SLP. The SLP says there is “no last seen theory” and the prosecution has failed to point to any evidence of “prior criminal conspiracy” between the co-accused of Sheena’s kidnapping and murder over the past six years.
SLP will be heard in due course.
The order of the HC denying bail on merit had said, “The statement of the witnesses recorded under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure consistently includes the name of the applicant directly involved in the offence. Shyamvar Rai, the accused turned public witness, has specifically named the applicant to have committed the offense” and argued, “As far as the testimony of the approver is concerned and other evidence like CDR records, it is not required to go into it. especially when the trial is at a critical stage. The important witnesses are yet to be examined and the release of the applicant is likely to hamper further prosecution in the trial.”
watch Sheena Bora murder case: Supreme Court grants bail to Indrani Mukerjea