Ankita Bhandari case: Court defers verdict on narco, polygraph tests of accused till January 10
Jan 05, 2023
Dehradun (Uttarakhand) [India], January 5 : The First Class Judicial Magistrate Court Kotdwar on Thursday postponed for 5 days the verdict on the narco and polygraph tests of the accused in the Ankita Bhandari murder case.
The court, on January 3, had posted the date for the verdict in a hearing on January 3 this year.
On behalf of the prosecution, the time has been sought to file the ruling in the court, after which the court will now give its verdict in the entire case on January 10.
It is worth mentioning that today the Judicial Magistrate Court was about to give its verdict regarding the narco test of the three accused in the Ankita murder case, but the time was sought from the court to file the ruling on behalf of the prosecution, after which the decision was postponed today.
Government lawyer Jitendra Singh said that the court's ruling would be filed soon by the prosecution and a decision will come on January 10.
The case pertains to 19-year-old Ankita, whose body was recovered from the Chilla canal in Rishikesh on September 24.
She was reported missing for at least six days before the officials found her body.
She worked as a receptionist at a resort run by Pulkit Arya, the son of expelled BJP leader Vinod Arya. Pulkit Arya was arrested for allegedly pushing her into the canal following an altercation. Two more people - Ankit Gupta and Saurabh Bhaskar, have also been arrested in the case.
On December 4, the Uttarakhand Police said that the investigation into the Ankita Bhandari murder case is almost complete. The only procedure that remains is the narco tests of the accused, for which they had sought permission from the Kotdwar court to conduct narco and polygraph tests of all three accused.
Earlier, the three accused, including expelled BJP leader's son Pulkit Arya refused to undergo narco and polygraph tests, citing that the SIT did not explain why it wanted to conduct narco and polygraph tests after filing the charge sheet.