Sheena''s biological father comes out in open, FSL gets samples

Mumbai/Kolkata, September 1

A day after gory details of Sheena Bora murder case were revealed by police in court, her biological father on Tuesday came out in the open for the first time while skeletal remains purportedly of the 24-year-old unearthed in Raigad were sent to Forensic Science Laboratory in Mumbai.

Siddharth Das today said he was Sheena's biological father though he had never married her mother and main accused Indrani Mukherjea and said "she should be hanged" if she had committed the murder.

He said that Indrani had left him in 1989 and they had not been in touch since then. Das said he came to know about the "murder through newspapers" and was ready to cooperate in the investigation.

Sheena and Mikhail, who lives in Guwahati, are Indrani's children with Das.

"I want her to be hanged, if she killed Sheena.... I am feeling very heartbroken.

"I never married Indrani officially. I met Indrani in college in 1986. She left me in 1989. Maybe Indrani wasn't satisfied with my state as I did not have a job then," Das said in Kolkata, coming out in the open for the first time since the case grabbed headlines with the arrest of Indrani, wife of media baron Peter Mukherjea, a week ago.

 Das said he was ready for a DNA test. On whether Indrani could have murdered Sheena, he said, "I believe Indrani could do this".

Yesterday, the metropolitan court had extended the police custody of all three accused - Indrani, her ex-husband Sanjeev Khanna and driver Shyam Rai - till September 5.

Investigators probing the case have said suspects Indrani and Sanjeev allegedly placed Sheena's body on the seat of their vehicle as they drove from Mumbai to Raigad to dump it there.

Explaining the sequence in which the body was disposed of, the Mumbai Police for the first time told the Bandra Metropolitan Magistrate court that after Sheena was murdered on April 24, 2012 the corpse was first kept in a suitcase and driven to the garage of Indrani's husband and former Star TV CEO Peter Mukerjea's Worli home.

On April 25, Indrani, her former husband Sanjeev Khanna and driver Shyam Rai took the corpse out of the suitcase and placed it inside the car. The three then set off for a three-hour journey with the corpse propped up on the seat of the moving vehicle.

The body was finally taken out at Ghogade Khurd in Pen and stuffed back in the suitcase kept in the boot of the car, documents filed by the police in the court yesterday, said.

The police had also told the court that they would like to establish the "financial trail" in the crime.

The skeletal remains unearthed in Raigad district where the 24-year-old victim's body was allegedly dumped in 2012 today reached the Forensics Science Laboratory in Mumbai.

Recently, FSL also received blood samples of Indrani and her son Mikhail Bora, which would be used for DNA matching with samples of the skeletal remains.

During interrogation, Indrani has reportedly maintained that Sheena is in the US and is not coming forward as she hates her.

Yesterday, Indrani was charged with poisoning and attempting to murder Mikhail on the day her daughter Sheena was allegedly killed more than three years ago.

Mikhail had earlier told the police that she had thrice attempted to kill him and also spiked his drink the day Sheena disappeared in April 2012 following which the police included the additional two charges in the FIR filed in the case.

According to Mikhail's allegations, hours before Sheena was taken out by Indrani and Khanna on April 24, 2012 on what turned out to be the last drive of her life, Indrani had drugged him.

He managed to escape from the spot and averted becoming the second murder victim, he said. —PTI