Was Sheena Bora murdered for Rs 900 cr? Mystery over money angle

Sheena Bora, Indrani Mukerjea, Peter Mukerjea, Sanjeev Khanna

Police escorted Peter Mukerjea and Sanjeev Khanna

It was in September 2016, when Fadnavis was quoted as saying that the ‘financial angle' involved in the murder was the reason that the state had decided to transfer the probe over to the Central Bureau of Investigation. However, yesterday, a senior police officer, aghast with the manner in which the CBI handled the case, lamented, "What wrong did we do? Instead of appreciating our work in detecting such a high-profile case, the investigating team was humiliated and shunted out for no fault."

Also read - Mumbai Crime: Mother Indrani killed daughter Sheena, says CBI court

Arthur Road jail after dropping Indrani Mukerjea at the Byculla jail. Pics/Suresh Karkera, Bipin Kokate

Money trail?
Speaking to mid-day, even Peter Mukerjea's defence lawyer, Mihir Gheewala, raised the obvious question: Where is the financial angle? "The CBI worked on the case for the last year-and-a-half, and right from the beginning, portrayed as if a huge financial scam - almost to the tune of Rs 900 crore - was one of motives for Sheena's murder. The CBI had even claimed that Peter and Indrani had siphoned off the money that they got from the sale of INX News."

YP Singh and Mihir Gheewala, Peter's lawyer, question the financial angle theory

Later, during seeking Peter's remand, the CBI informed the court that they were probing a bank account in Singapore that was probably opened in Sheena's name, that all the money might have been illegally deposited that bank account, and that these financial transactions could reveal the real motive behind the murder of Sheena.

Sheena Bora with Rahul Mukerjea

Meanwhile, Gautam Mukerjea, Peter's brother who is in town from Goa to attend the hearing, said, "I am a prosecution witness in the case now, and so is Rahul, so it is not right on my part to make any statement at this stage."

Peter and Indrani in happier times

Angle gone missing
Interestingly though, in all its three chargesheets (one main and two supplementary) filed till date, the CBI has not mentioned anything about the money trail that they were probing. "This was one of the major reasons for roping the CBI into the case, but the very angle could not be probed," said Gheewala, adding, "The Mumbai police had investigated the case and detected the crime with the arrest of Indrani and other involved accused. They even exhumed the body and matched the skeletal remains with Indrani's, but before they could proceed any further, the case was handed over to CBI. Other than arresting Peter and showing him as a conspirator in the case, the CBI has not made any headway in all this time."

Police still miffed
The Mumbai police officer, dejected after the charges were framed yesterday, said, "Sheena Bora was hacked to death in 2012 and everyone, including the accused, had forgotten about her. It was the Mumbai police that followed the tip and unmasked the high-profile people involved in the crime. It was all part of our discreet detection, which was meticulously planned and executed, that within 14 days, the case was cracked and those involved were arrested."

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However, he claims, "We were shunted out of our positions, we were humiliated and our hard work was ignored. We are back to our normal policing, but this entire episode has hit the morale badly," adding, "Most of the news channels had the panelists and anchors shouting that the Khar police had missed the huge ‘financial angle'. Why are they silent today?"

Expert speaks
IPS officer-turned-lawyer YP Singh, who was also a panelist in one such discussion, admitted that the CBI had not come up with anything credible on the financial angle. "The money trail itself was a concocted story. It now seems that the entire angle was blown up in the media due to a systematic leak of information from those who were privy to the investigation," he says, adding, "No one showed any application of mind; asking a simple question - Sheena was penniless, then how could money be a motive for the murder?"

However, when reminded that he was amongst those who supported the money trail theory, he refuted, "Right from the beginning, I maintained that money could not be a motive for murder. I never supported this theory and was skeptical about it from the beginning."

Yet, on the notion that the CBI could still file a supplementary chargesheet on discovering additional evidence on the financial trail, he said, "Once the chargesheet is filed, it is understood that the investigation is over. The CBI, though, can always file any new evidence during the course of the trial with due permission of the court."

What CBI says
On being posed the question of the missing financial angle, acting CBI spokesperson simply said, "Further investigation is continuing."

However, for more clarity, a senior CBI officer, on condition of anonymity, said, "We have written letters rogatory to Singapore, UK, USA in connection to the overseas money trail probe; we are yet to receive feedback from them."