Why the haste to close Aarushi case, court asks CBI

GHAZIABAD - The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) report seeking closure of the Aarushi Talwar murder case was Monday registered in a court here, which questioned the agency on its haste to shut the case.

However, the CBI special court has deferred its hearing in the case saying it would declare the next date of hearing in the afternoon.

In fact, the probe agency had to face the wrath of the CBI court. At 11.20 a.m., when CBI special magistrate Preeti Singh took up the case, she asked the CBI lawyer what was the agency’s reason to file the closure report in haste.

CBI lawyer R.S. Saini, in his reply, said that they have to file closure reports on cases by Dec 31, which is a routine affair.

Saini said: “It is a routine affair in the agency. The investigating officer would submit all the annexures later when the court observes that the closure report is lacking annexures.”

Rajesh and Nupur Talwar, the parents of murdered teenager Aarushi, were also present in the court. They had come to seek a copy of the CBI closure report after the agency named Rajesh Talwar as the lone suspect in the murder of Aarushi and their servant Hemraj in May 16, 2008.

Asked what the Talwars planned to do, their lawyer Satish Tamta said: “We are here to look into the developments and were to file a protest (against Rajesh Talwar being named as lone suspect). But the scenario has changed with the court now asking the CBI to get the closure report first registered in the case.”

The court asked the CBI to come in the afternoon to know the next hearing date.

Fourteen-year-old Aarushi was found murdered under mysterious circumstances in her parents’ Jalvayu Vihar apartment in Noida, Delhi’s suburban town in Uttar Pradesh, May 16, 2008. The family’s domestic help, Hemraj, was also found killed on the flat’s terrace a day later.

The CBI Wednesday moved the Ghaziabad court seeking permission to close the Aarushi murder as an unsolved case on grounds of lack of conclusive evidence.