Indrani’s ex-husband, driver taken to Raigad to ‘recreate’ crime scene

Mumbai, August 30

Indrani Mukerjea’s former husband Sanjeev Khanna and her driver Shyam Rai were today taken to Raigad district to 'recreate' the crime scene in the Sheena Bora murder case by Mumbai Police as investigators sought to gather evidence.

Accused Sanjeev Khanna was brought to Khar police station and later taken to the forest in Pen tehsil, along with the driver, police said.

During sustained interrogation here yesterday, Indrani and Sanjeev blamed each other for the crime.

Indrani's son and Sheena's brother Mikhail Bora was also questioned at a hotel in Bandra yesterday.

Police are also probing Mikhail's claim that just hours before Indrani and Sanjeev met Sheena on April 24, 2012 and took her for what would be the last drive of her life, Indrani had also allegedly drugged him. By the time they came back, the suspicious, groggy Mikhail had fled.

Meanwhile, a village official in Raigad district, who helped Mumbai Police team locate the spot where Sheena Bora was allegedly buried, today said when he first spotted the body in 2012 it was just a skeleton with no flesh.

"It was all skeleton. There was no flesh. The local government doctor took it for post mortem, after which it was buried," Police Patil Ganesh Dhene of Hetevne village said.

Asked how he came across the skeletal remains, Dhene said, "I had gone to collect mangoes. The body was not in a suitcase. The surrounding area was burnt."       Indrani, her driver Shyam Rai and Khanna were interrogated at Khar police station yesterday. During the course of the grilling, they blamed each other for the crime, a police official said.

Police said Khanna and Indrani were giving evasive replies during interrogation.

The car in which Sheena Bora was allegedly killed was yesterday traced, even as questions cropped up about a cover-up by police in not registering a case of murder or accidental death three years back when a partially-burnt body, believed to be hers, was found.

"We have traced the car. The car had changed many hands in three years and we are yet to recover it," said a senior police official.

As the investigation focused on forensic examination of the skeletal remains found in Pen tehsil of Raigad, the police also admitted that no due procedure was followed when the body was first found on May 23, 2012.

"Neither a crime, nor a report of accidental death was registered when Raigad Police sent recovered skeletal remains to JJ hospital (in Mumbai) in 2012," Raigad's current Superintendent of Police Suvez Haque told reporters in Alibaug, the district headquarters.

Though Sheena, daughter of high-profile media professional Indrani Mukerjea, was allegedly murdered in 2012 and the body disposed of in Raigad district, the crime came to light only recently.

JJ Hospital had on Friday handed over to Khar Police a few bones it had received from Raigad Police in 2012.

The blood and hair samples of Indrani and Mikhail Bora have also been collected and sent to Forensic Science Laboratory and the report is expected in three to four days.

According to Mumbai Police Commissioner Rakesh Maria, who is personally involved in the grilling of the accused, Khanna had confessed to his complicity in the murder.

On Friday, the police also briefly questioned Indrani's husband and former Star India CEO Peter Mukerjea.

Police had earlier questioned Rahul Mukerjea, Peter Mukerjea's son from another marriage, who allegedly had a relationship with Sheena which Indrani disapproved of. — PTI