Mumbai sessions court has found artist Chintan Upadhyay guilty of abetting and conspiring the murder of his estranged wife, artist Hema Upadhyay, and her lawyer Harish Bhambhani in 2015.
Chintan has been found guilty under Section 109 read with 120B of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for abetting and conspiring the murders of Hema and Bhambhani, IE reported.
“Three other accused — Vijay Rajbhar, Pradeep Rajbhar and Shivkumar Rajbhar — were found guilty on charges, including murder under section 302, destruction of evidence under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The court will hear the accused on the quantum of punishment on Saturday,” the report said.
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Chintan was out on bail since 2021 when the Supreme Court granted him bail taking into account that he had spent six years in jail and the trial was not complete, it mentioned.
On Thursday, after he was pronounced guilty by the court in Dindoshi, additional sessions judge SY Bhosale directed for him to be taken into custody till October 7, when the court will hear him and the three other accused on the sentence they should be given.
The report quoting special public prosecutor Vaibhav Bagade said that he will be seeking the maximum punishment of death penalty since the incident involved the murder of a lawyer.
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According to the case, Hema and Bhambhani went missing on December 11, 2015. The next day, a scrap collector alerted the police that two suspicious-looking cardboard boxes wrapped in white plastic were seen floating in a nullah in the northern suburb of Kandivali, the report mentioned.
It said the bodies of Hema and Bhambhani were found inside the boxes.
“Ten days later, the Mumbai Police arrested Chintan claiming that the murders were done by the co-accused at his behest over his strained relationship with Hema. The prosecution had claimed that Chintan had hatched the murder conspiracy with Vidyadhar Rajbhar, a fabricator, who was employed earlier by the couple to make their artwork, promising money in exchange for the killings. Vidyadhar has been on the run since the murders and is named as an absconding accused in the case,” it said.
The prosecution examined 56 witnesses and CCTV footage at Kandivali in the northern suburbs of Mumbai where Hema and Bhambhani could be seen entering Vidyadhar’s Kandivali unit, where the three accused met them, it mentioned.
Police claimed Hema was lured by Vidyadhar claiming that he had information to give her on Chintan related to their matrimonial dispute, it said.
Bhambhani, who was representing Hema in her divorce and other related proceedings, decided to accompany her, it said.
