Jiah Khan Dead, Suicide Case Update: Suraj Pancholi Lawyers Oppose Narco-Test
Lawyers representing Suraj Pancholi in the case of his girlfriend's suicide denied consent to police who sought a court's permission to conduct a narco-analysis test on their client, they said Friday.
Mumbai police a day earlier filed a court application requesting that they be allowed to test Pancholi, son of an actor couple arrested on charges of abetting the suicide of 25-year-old Bollywood actress Jiah Khan. As per the law, no chemical tests can be conducted on an accused without his or her consent.
Narco-analysis involves the intravenous administration of sodium pentothal, a barbiturate that lowers a person's inhibitions and induces him/her to talk freely. In May 2010 the Supreme Court ruled that the conduct of narco-analysis, brain mapping and polygraph tests on crime accused, suspects and witnesses can only be performed with their consent.
"We are not going to give our consent to it as Suraj is of tender age," Pancholi's advocate Zamir Khan said Friday, according to the Business Standard. "Police moved this application after his judicial custody was extended and they tried to get an order on our back."
Pancholi was sent to judicial custody until July 11 while his bail hearing in the Bombay high court will be heard on July 1, The Times of India reported. The application for the narco-analysis test will also be heard by the magistrate court on July 1. The test was previously applied to 26/11 terrorist Ajmal Kasab, stamp paper scam kingpin Abdul Telgi and a suspect in the Kurla rape-murder case, according to the report.
Khan committed suicide on June 3 and Pancholi, son of Bollywood actors Aditya Pancholi and Zarina Wahab, was arrested days later when her family found Khan's six-page suicide note. Suraj was arrested on the basis of the letter, which claimed the former couple had a troubled relationship. Khan's mother, Rabia Amin, claimed that Sooraj compelled the late actress to kill herself.
The sessions court on June 21 rejected Suraj's bail application.