the goan I network
PANAJI
The alleged ‘dupatta killer' Mahanand Naik and jeweler Ulhas Rivonkar have been acquitted in yet another case of murder. With the police failing to trace the body of the deceased woman, Additional Sessions Court, North Goa, acquitted Mahanand from the charge of murdering Nirmala Ghadi of Betique Vadi, Ponda, in May 2007.
The alleged serial killer has now been acquitted in ten of the 16 murders committed by him, approximately from 1995 to 2009, when he was arrested. He has been convicted in two cases so far.
Ponda Police had filed a chargesheet against Mahanand under under Section 364 (kidnapping), 302 (murder), 392 (robbery) and 201 (destroying evidence) of Indian Penal Code while Rivonkar was charged under Section 411 (dishonestly receiving stolen property) of IPC.
The deceased was employed at a pickle and papad factory at Marcel and was reported missing since May 11, 2007. Her family stated that on the fateful day, she left for work and never returned home. A day before her disappearance, Nirmala had asked her sister for the gold ornaments which were in her safekeeping. She told her sister that she had to attend a friend's marriage. However, none of the witnesses saw the deceased wearing the said pieces of jewellery.
Though the Court presumed that Nirmala has died, as she was not heard from by her family for over seven years, it highlighted the fact that the dead body of
Nirmala has not been found till date.
"It may have been otherwise if the dead body was found and there was medical evidence pointing to the death being due to murder. In the absence of such medical evidence and also the absence of di rect evidence of murder, it cannot be held that the death of Nirmala was due to murder," the judgment states.
The Court also ruled out the ‘last seen' theory as the evidence brought on record failed to prove the time of Nirmala's death and with it the impossibility of any other person coming into contact with her prior to her death.
Doubts were also raised over the authenticity of the recording of Mahanand's confessional statement that he had killed Nirmala near a sluice gate below the Borim Bridge in Ponda.
