Sippy Sidhu murder: CBI court rejects Kalyani’s bail plea

The investigation into Sippu Sidhu’s murder is at a crucial stage, as the weapon of offence and co-accused are to be found out and arrested, said the CBI court while rejecting Kalyani’s bail plea

Observing that the investigation is at a crucial stage and there is every apprehension of her pressurising the witnesses, a special CBI court on Wednesday dismissed the bail plea of Kalyani Singh, an accused in the murder of national-level shooter and lawyer Sukhmanpreet Singh, alias Sippy Sidhu.

Kalyani was arrested for Sippy Sidhu’s murder on June 15 and has been in judicial custody since June 21. (HT File Photo)

Sidhu was shot dead at a Sector-27 park on the evening of September 20, 2015. After over six years, Kalyani, 36, daughter of justice Sabina, a judge at the Himachal Pradesh high court, was arrested on June 15.

According to the CBI investigation, Kalyani was in a close relationship with Sippy, but her marriage proposal was turned down by his family. Further, Sippy leaked her objectionable photographs, which caused embarrassment to Kalyani and her family.

To get rid of Sippy, on September 20, Kalyani, along with an unknown assailant, murdered Sippy by using fire arms and were seen running from the spot, CBI has claimed.

“There is prima facie involvement of applicant/accused Kalyani Singh in the commission of murder of deceased Sippy Sidhu,” the agency had stated in court.

Kalyani’s counsel Sartej Narula had argued that CBI had falsely implicated Kalyani without any evidence.

“Sippy’s post-mortem report would show that it is not Kalyani, but someone taller than Sippy who fired those shots. Also, Sippy had six girlfriends, several property disputes and was being threatened by someone. Those persons could be responsible for his death and not Kalyani,” her bail application had stated.

Pleading for bail for Kalyani, who is in judicial custody since June 21, it was argued that she had always cooperated with the investigation and will not tamper with any evidence.

But public prosecutor PK Dogra termed the accused as a “clever person” who even remained “deceptive” during her polygraph test.

Dogra said the investigation was at a very crucial stage and Kalyani belonged to an influential family. “If she is released on bail, prosecution’s entire case will suffer, which has been brought on track with fresh investigation,” the public prosecutor argued.

After hearing both sides, special CBI judge Jagjit Singh dismissed the bail application. “The investigation is at a crucial stage, as the weapon of offence and co-accused are to be found out and arrested,” the order read.

The judge said there was no dispute about the accused being an influential person…and “there is every apprehension of her pressurising the witnesses and tampering with the evidence, if she is released on bail, which will hamper the subsequent trial”.

“At this stage, no ground is made out to allow the bail application and the same is accordingly dismissed,” the judge ordered.