The Delhi High Court on Friday asked Delhi Police to verify whether Vikas Yadav, convicted in the Nitish Katara murder case, was married in July or September this year.
This was after Nitish’s mother, Nilam Katara, urged a bench of Justice Ravinder Dudeja to initiate perjury proceedings against Yadav alleging that he misled the court by seeking interim bail on the grounds of marriage, despite tying the knot in July at “The Aura” in Sector 74, Noida.
Nilam, represented by advocate Vrinda Bhandari, submitted that Yadav sought bail on the same ground twice, first for his marriage on September 5, and then to spend time with his wife. Bhandari further submitted that she had photographic evidence to support her claim.
Yadav’s counsel, Jitender Sethi, however, denied the allegation, asserting that the photographs relied on by Nilam were of the engagement ceremony, which took place in July, while the actual marriage took place in September.
He submitted that the marriage took place at his residence in Ghaziabad, and the certificate, along with the wedding photographs, had been placed on record as a part of his appeal before the Supreme Court challenging the high court’s September 9 order.
To be sure, the high court on September 9 had dismissed Yadav’s petition seeking extension of interim bail, saying it did not have the power to grant or extend interim bail post-conviction. Sethi also contested the maintainability of the application. “They say it appears to be a wedding and not saying that these are false,” Sethi added.
The Delhi police’s special public prosecutor Rajesh Mahajan sought time to verify the contents of the application.
Taking note of the conflicting claims, the court issued a notice on Nilam Katara’s application seeking initiation of perjury proceedings and has asked the Delhi Police to file a status report after verifying the facts. The court will next hear the matter on December 9.
“Issue notice. Notice is accepted by the special public prosecutor for the Delhi police, who seeks time to verify the contents of the application and place on record a status report. State is directed to place on record a status report after due verification,” the court said in its order.
In her application, Katara asserted that Yadav deliberately and intentionally made false statements under oath and produced false evidence, with malafide intent to avail undue benefits of interim bail.
Nilam’s application also pointed to multiple instances of Yadav violating the law since the 2002 murder. “Petitioner, during his trial, obstructed the trial, led false evidence and put pressure on public witnesses as well as the public prosecutor. In fact, out of the 43 witnesses, all witnesses except one (Mr Ajay Katara) turned hostile, including the police officials. In fact, to intimidate and browbeat the prosecutors in the trial, the Petitioner sent them legal notices and filed complaints and civil suits against them,” it said. It added, “Post the conviction by the Ld. Trial Court, the Petitioner unauthorisedly visited different hospitals more than 100 times in connivance with the prison and hospital authorities, wherein on multiple occasions he was found missing from hospital room, and for various visits, no treatment records were found with the hospital.”
The application was filed in Yadav’s petition seeking release from jail.
Nitish Katara was abducted from a marriage party on the intervening night of February 16 and 17, 2002, and then killed over his alleged relationship with Vikas’s sister, Bharti Yadav.
The trial court in May 2008, found former Uttar Pradesh politician DP Yadav’s son Vikas, Vishal Yadav and their aide contract killer Sukhdev Pehelwan, guilty of kidnapping and burning Katara to death and had awarded them life sentence. The high court in February 2015, while upholding the life imprisonment awarded to Vikas and Vishal, specified a 30-year sentence without any remission and awarded a 25-year jail term without remission to Sukhdev. The Supreme Court in July 2016, modified Vikas and Vishal’s sentence to 25 years without remission and Sukhdev’s sentence to 20-year jail term without remission to Sukhdev.