Adnan murder: Four acquitted in case linked to Orkut

January 30, 2012

Adnan30Jan

Mumbai, January 30: A Mumbai court has today acquitted four men accused of kidnapping and murdering Mumbai teenager Adnan Patrawala in 2007, who they had allegedly met via social networking site Orkut.


The verdict is being read by the city as a moment of shame for the Mumbai Police, whose lethargic inquiry has belied what experts say was an open-and-shut case.

The court said there was not enough evidence to prove that the arrested men are guilty. A fifth - who is a minor and is being tried separately - is also likely to be declared innocent.

At a press conference today, Adnan's father, Aslam, steered clear of criticizing the police, saying only that he would appeal to a higher court.

"We are satisfied with what the police have done. I don't know what went wrong," he said.

At the court, another father expressed his thanks. "I am relieved that my son is innocent. The way he was trapped anything could have happened to him,'' said Arun Bhatt, whose young son, Ayush, had been in jail for the murder since 2007.

16-year-old Adnan's murder on an August night in 2007 made headlines for many reasons. His alleged killers were young and included two teens. They had befriended the rich Andheri businessman's son on Orkut, hugely popular among teens at the time for social networking. After they kidnapped him, reports on a television channel allegedly triggered panic. And they decided to strangle him.

The court said that forensic and circumstantial evidence was crudely handled by the police so that instead of complimenting each other, the different pieces of information rattled around in a largely incongruous narrative against the accused.

On the evening of August 18, 2007, Adnan took his father's Skoda to meet with his friends at a gaming parlour at a mall in North West Mumbai. The group of five people he was meeting with used to interact with him regularly on Orkut. They had zeroed in on him after scanning the site for other potential victims. According to the police, the men wanted quick money. Some had debts they needed to settle. They drew up a list of people they could kidnap for ransom. Adnan appeared trusting and came from a wealthy family.

The alleged killers, according to the police, offered Adnan a spiked drink and suggested they go for a drive. The next morning, Adnan's father received a call asking for a two-crore ransom. Meanwhile, news of the kidnapping had broken on TV. So Adnan's abductors strangled him, dumped his body in some bushes on Palm Beach Road in Navi Mumbai, and took local trains home.

The only eyewitness produced by the police was the last person to see Adnan live. He said Adnan's dead body was discovered on August 19. Police records list the next day. Cellphone records for some of those accused of the murder did not include the crucial details of three different calls made to Adnan's father for ransom. The court today also said it was hard to believe the eyewitness' claim that the murder ws planned to the last detail in a busy mall.


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News Network
January 17,2020

Jan 17: Police have busted a "high- profile" sex racket operating in a three-star hotel in suburban Andheri and arrested a 29-year-old woman and rescued three female artists, including a minor, an official said on Thursday.

The Social Service (SS) branch of the city police conducted the raid at the hotel at Andheri East on Thursday, the official said.

"During the raid, three females, including a minor, were found to have been forced into prostitution. They were rescued and a woman, identified as Priya Sharma, who was operating the racket, was arrested," he said.

"Sharma was running tours and travel agency in Kandivali East. However, she was involved in immoral activities," senior inspector of SS branch, Sandesh Revale, said.

While one of the rescued is a woman actor and singer, who has worked in 'Savdhaan India' TV crime show, he said, another one has worked in a Marathi movie and serials.

The minor has worked in a web series, Revale added.

The offence was being registered against Sharma, he said.

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Agencies
February 26,2020

Kota, Feb 26: At least 24 people died and four others sustained injuries as a private bus carrying a wedding party fell into a river on Kota–Dausa highway in Bundi district on Wednesday morning, police said.

The wedding party with 28 persons on board was headed to Sawai Madhopur from Kota early morning when the driver apparently lost balance of the bus while traversing a bridge near Papdi village under Lekhari police station limits, Lakheri Sub-Inspector Rajendra Kumar said.

The bus, subsequently, plunged into Mej river from the bridge that had no wall or railing, Kumar said.

Thirteen people died on the spot while 10 others succumbed to their injuries on way to hospital, he added.

The deaths include 11 men, 10 women and three children.

The injured were rushed to Lekhari government hospital from where the critically injured are being referred to a government hospital in Kota, the SI further said.

Most of the injured people were rescued with the help of locals in the village, he added.

Mej river is a tributary of the Chambal river in Rajasthan.

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News Network
June 6,2020

Kota (Rajasthan), Jun 6: A 14-year-old boy allegedly hanged himself to death on early Saturday morning shortly after he stopped playing PUBG throughout the night and went to sleep, said police. 

Railway Colony police station’s in-charge Hansraj Meena said the boy, a class 9 student and son of an Army man, was found hanging from the grill of the ventilator in his bedroom on early Saturday morning. 

Meena said according to the boy’s family members, the boy had downloaded the gaming programme on his mother’s mobile phone only three days back but had been playing the game virtually continuously for the last three days. 

He kept on playing the game till 3 am in a room in which his brother was studying, said Meena, adding the boy went to adjoining to sleep after that. His body was found hanging from the ventilator’s grill in the morning, he said, adding the boy was rushed to MBS Hospital, where he was declared “brought dead”. 

No suicide note was recovered in the case, the SHO said. The boy lived in Gandhi Colony in the city along with his mother and brother, while his father, a Tamil Nadu native and Army man, is currently posted in Arunachal Pradesh. The boy’s body has been kept in hospital’s morgue for the postmortem, the SHO said.

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