Jiah Khan suicide case: Mother moves Bombay HC, says daughter was murdered

Zee Media Bureau/ Harpreet Kaur

New Delhi: Rabbiya Khan, mother of actress Jiah Khan, is determined to prove that her daughter was murdered. Jiah was found hanging in her Juhu apartment on June 3 earlier this year. The petition, filed on October 1, is expected to come up for hearing before a single-judge Bench next week, her lawyer Dinesh Tiwari told reporters. Jiah's mother Rabia Amin has alleged that it has come to light that her daughter may have been killed and made to look as if she committed suicide. To support her argument, Rabia has annexed to the petition an independent forensic expert's report which indicates the case to be homicidal death rather than suicide. Alleging shoddy investigations by police to help Jiah's boyfriend Suraj Pancholi, the petition demands a CBI probe into the murder. The petitioner said that she had strong reasons to suspect that the probe was carried out by police in a manner which made the death look like a suicide. She alleged that Suraj is the son of actor Aditya Pancholi and the family had used their clout to "manage" police. The petition alleges that Jiah may have been hanged after being killed. It cites some reasons to support this theory. The petition says that a person who commits suicide would have his or her eyes popping and tongue protruding out, while in the case of Jiah it was not so. Also, in such cases lung or brain hemorrhage is generally noticed, but in this case this was not observed. The petition says that besides ligature marks that occur in death due to hanging, injury marks were noticed on Jiah's face and body. An injury was noticed on the right side of her lips and a mark on her left arm suggested as if someone had held her tightly. While police claimed that Jiah had hanged herself with a muslin 'dupatta', forensic expert Dr R N Jerajani opined that the depth of ligature marks in Jiah's case was difficult to achieve with a soft material. Dr Jerajani has further opined that the ligature marks on Jiah's neck are not like the ones usually found on the body of a person who hangs self from a ceiling fan. The possibility of strangulation is not ruled out in this case, he said in the forensic report. The petition further said that CCTV camera footage showed that Jiah had entered her house a few minutes before she committed suicide. At that time, she was wearing a track suit but her body was discovered in a night gown. Would a person about to commit suicide change her dress, the petition asks? It further said that the ceiling fan was located in between two single beds and it was not possible for Jiah to hang herself without a stool and there was no stool in her house. There is a window in Jiah's room at a low level in the first-floor flat. This window was found open although air-condition machine was on at the time of the incident, the petition said, adding that the window could have been used to gain entry into the room. Jiah’s boyfriend Sooraj Pancholi, who Rabbiya believes is responsible for her death, was arrested on charges of abetting her suicide, but was released on bail after serving 21 days in jail in the month of June. Jiah had made her debut opposite Amitabh Bachchan in Ram Gopal Varma’s ‘Nishabd’ and also shared screen space with Aamir Khan in ‘Ghajini’ and Akshay Kumar in ‘Housefull’. (With PTI inputs)