Uttarakhand police file charge sheet in Ankita Bhandari murder case

Kotdwar/Dehradun, December 20

The Uttarakhand police has filed a charge sheet in the Ankita Bhandari murder case in a Kotdwar court against three accused, including the son of a former state BJP leader.

In the 500-page charge sheet, prepared by the SIT, 97 people have been made witnesses, public prosecutor Jitendra Rawat said.

Saurabh Bhaskar, Ankit Gupta and Pulkit Arya, the son of a former state BJP leader and the operator of a resort in Pauri district where 19-year-old Bhandari worked, have been charged under several IPC sections, including murder.

The accused have also been charged under IPC sections relating to causing disappearance of evidence of an offence or giving false information, criminal conspiracy and sexual harassment, and under the Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act.

The charge sheet was submitted in the court of Judicial Magistrate (first class) Bhavna Pandey, on Monday, Rawat said.

Bhandari, who worked as a receptionist at Vanantara Resort in the Ganga Bhogpur area of Pauri district near Rishikesh, was allegedly pushed into the Chilla canal in September this year by Arya in collusion with two of his employees, Saurabh Bhaskar and Ankit Gupta.

During interrogation, it was revealed that Bhandari was killed for allegedly refusing to provide “extra service” to a VIP.

Earlier, state police spokesperson and Additional Director General of Police (Crime and Law and Order) V Murugesan had said the police have enough evidence against the accused, including Bhandari’s post-mortem report and FSL test of electronic evidence recovered from the crime scene.

Following a public outcry over the killing, the state government constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by Deputy Inspector General of Police P Renuka Devi to probe the matter.