Mattoo was not raped: Defence

New DElhi: In a staggering development, the defence has contended that Priyadarshini Mattoo was not raped.

The defence counsel has stated that the evidence was tampered with to prove that Priyadarshini was raped.

The High Court observed, "We should not rely only on the trial court's judgement in deciding this case and new facts, if any, must be brought before the court to bring the guilty to book."

Counsel for accused Santosh Singh in the Priyadarshini Mattoo rape and murder case, R K Naseem, had on Wednesday, accused the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) of planting false witnesses and suppressing his client - the main accused Santosh Singh's - medical report.

Appearing before a division bench of the Delhi High Court headed by Justices R S Sodhi and P K Bhasin, Naseem rejected the depositions of two witnesses, Kuppuswamy and Jaideep Singh Ahluwalia.

"It is not a coincidence that both depositions took place on February 4, 1996," he said.

"Kuppuswamy's deposition that he had seen Santosh Singh outside Priyadarshini Mattoo's residence at 1730 hrs IST on January 23, 1996 was used by the CBI as a strong circumstantial evidence against the accused. The truth is his deposition was an after thought and after careful deliberation," Naseem said citing liberally from the case diary, documented by the police.

"Had Kuppuswamy really seen the accused, he would have told about it much earlier than he did. His reaction would have been spontaneous at the first given opportunity. However, he divulged out the 'last-seen-theory' much later when many opportunities had passed," Naseem added.

Another witness Jaideep Singh claimed to have been mildly run into by a stranger, appearing nervous, in front of Priyadarshini Mattoo's residence at 1720 hrs IST on January 23, 1996.

"The CBI has attempted to avail services of false witnesses to earn conviction against Santosh Singh," Naseem alleged adding that even the trial court had not believed Jaideep Singh and commented that the witness had no occasion to be present there.

The counsel also accused the CBI of suppressing the medical reports of the injury on Santosh Singh's right hand due to an accident on January 14, 1996.

He gave an exhaustive account of the X ray reports done at Nirmal Diagonostics and the treatment Santosh Singh received at Bara Hindu Rao Hospital.

Naseem said the CBI had committed injustice by suppressing the medical reports to make it appear an attempt by the accused to camouflage the injury received while allegedly bludgeoning Priyadarshini to death.

Arguing in the court on Wednesday, Santosh's lawyer said that he had fractured his hand on January 14 after falling off his motorbike.

However, this argument did not impress the Bench, which asked if the accused had injured his hand then how was he driving the motorcycle around Delhi University campus on the day of incident.

"There should have been some bruises on the hand if the accused fell from his motorcycle and got such an injury," the Bench observed.

To this Naseem replied that CBI did not have the evidence to prove its allegation that Singh was seen driving a motorbike in the university campus.

"No prosecution witness in their testimony has said having seen him in the campus with the motorbike," he submitted.

(With inputs from UNI and PTI)