Savvy Thakur
Published on: 01 December 2022 at 23:05 IST
The Delhi Police have approached the Delhi High Court to challenge the decision more than a year after a Delhi court cleared Congress MP Shashi Tharoor of all charges in a case involving the death of his wife Sunanda Pushkar.
Justice Dinesh Kumar Sharma, a single judge, heard the plea and issue notice to Tharoor of the Delhi Police’s application to excuse the delay in filing the revision petition.
On February 7, 2023, the matter will be heard again.
Tharoor was alleged to have played a role in Pushkar’s death, which occurred in January 2014
when she was found dead in a hotel room.
Even though the Delhi Police initially treated the incident as a murder, they charged Tharoor under Sections 306 (abetment of suicide) and 498A (cruelty by husband) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). An FIR was also filed under Section 302 (murder) against Tharoor.
In the case, Tharoor was discharged in August 2021 by a Special Court in Delhi that handles cases against legislators.
The court had noted that it had found no evidence that Tharoor had provoked, encouraged, or incited Pushkar to commit suicide when it discharged Tharoor.
Geetanjali Goel, the special judge, said that there was “nothing on record” to prove that Tharoor acted to annoy Pushkar until she reacted or “strongly persuaded or advised” her to kill herself.
Senior Counsel Vikas Pahwa, who was representing Tharoor at the hearing of the Delhi Police plea on Thursday, emphasized a number of issues, including the delay in filing the plea.
“We have not been served with the petition copy. The email address that was suspended by them has been purposefully used.This has been delayed by 15 months,” it was submitted.
He also argued that the lower court and the high court issued orders prohibiting the disclosure of the case’s records to any outside parties out of concern for a media trial.
The Delhi Police’s assertion that the case’s documents will not be provided to anyone who is not a party to the case was also recorded by the High Court.
After that, the court sent notice regarding the request for leniency regarding the delay.
Case Title: State of NCT of Delhi v. Shashi Tharoor