Delhi court discharges AAP MLA Sharad Kumar Chauhan in abetment to suicide case

NEW DELHI: The Rouse Avenue District Court discharged AAP MLA Sharad Kumar Chauhan in an abetment to suicide case and took note of the fact that there was no prima facie evidence against him on the same. 

The case pertained to the suicide of one female named whose name has not been disclosed to conceal her identity. The female was said to be a member of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). An FIR was filed on 20.07.2016 at PS Narela under Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) on the basis of a written statement made by one Ajay, who posed to be another member of AAP. 

Ajay claimed he was told by the deceased that she had consumed some poisonous substance because of the false allegations of extortion of money and a flat levelled against her and further as she could not get justice. Thereafter, Ajay talked to one Pratap who told him in turn that they were taking the deceased to Satyawadi Raja Harish Chandra Hospital (SRHC) and then Ajay had directly reached the hospital. The woman was then referred to LNJP hospital where she passed away during the treatment.

A charge sheet, in this case, was filed for the alleged commission of offences punishable under IPCs relating to abetment of suicide, causing disappearance of evidence of offence and criminal conspiracy. 

The court, however, noted that circumstances alleged against MLA Sharad Kumar Chauhan are not prima facie sufficient to hold him to be a member of any criminal conspiracy for commission of the offence of abetment to suicide or the other alleged offences nor these are sufficient to make him liable for the same individually. 

It has been further found by the court that MLA Sharad Kumar Chauhan has not been named in the audio/video recordings of the dying declarations of the deceased.

The court on Thursday also noted that the acts done or omissions made by Sharad Kumar Chauhan and others cannot be considered by the court to have been done by them with reference to any such criminal intent or design, the object of which was to push the deceased to commit suicide and further, cannot be considered as incriminating enough or sufficient to provoke, incite or urge the deceased to take her life. 

The court said the circumstances even fail to make a complete chain to enable the court to draw an inference about the existence of any such criminal conspiracy as it is well settled that this inference has to be reasonable and well-grounded. They even fail to establish any criminal intent on part of these accused persons to commit the alleged offence.