Hema Upadhyay-Harish Bhambhani murder case: Panch witness examined before trial court

The prosecution on Tuesday examined a panch witness on the seizure of the CCTV footage that captured artist Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer Harish Bhambhani outside a housing society on Smashanbhumi Road at Dhanukarwadi before they were allegedly killed

The prosecution on Tuesday examined a panch witness on the seizure of the CCTV footage that captured artist Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer Harish Bhambhani outside a housing society on Smashanbhumi Road at Dhanukarwadi before they were allegedly killed.

Hema Upadhyay HT Archives

The Dindoshi sessions court is hearing the double murder case.

Police claimed that the building is located on the backside of the warehouse where the duo was purportedly smothered. The video footage they seized from the society also showed three accused - Vidhyadhar Rajbhar, Vijay Rajbhar and Pradeep Rajbhar – and the tempo used for transporting and disposing of the bodies.

Advocate Anil Jadhav, appearing for Pradeep and Shivkumar Rajbhar, another accused, objected to the witness deposing on the contents of the footage and claimed that a copy of it had still not been given to the defence.

Jadhav also contended that the witness, Ajay Vora, was known to police and was therefore specifically called to act as a panch witness.

Hema and Bhambhani were killed on December 11, 2015. Their bodies were found stuffed in cardboard boxes, which were thrown into a ditch in Kandivali.

According to the prosecution, the murders were the handywork of Hema’s husband, Chintan Upadhyay, also an artist, who had hired the Rajbhars to get the two killed.