Interim bail denied to accused in Amravati chemist’s murder

A Mumbai court denied interim bail to Shahrukh Khan, accused in the murder of pharmacist Umesh Kolhe, citing risks to witnesses and evidence tampering.

MUMBAI: A special NIA court in Mumbai on Wednesday rejected the interim bail plea of 26-year-old Shahrukh Hidayat Khan, one of the accused in the 2022 murder of Amravati pharmacist Umesh Kolhe. He was allegedly killed for sharing a social media post in support of former BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma following her controversial remarks about Prophet Mohammad. Kolhe was stabbed to death while returning home on his scooter.

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Khan, an electrician from Amravati, had sought release on interim bail from October 22 to November 5 to attend his brother’s wedding and reception in the city. Turning down his plea, Special Judge Chakor Shrikrishna Baviskar said, “…the ground does not suit the conscience. It is a sort of enjoyment. His presence in the marriage is not at all inevitable. There is no mandate of any religion that one must be present for the marriage of his brother.”

The court noted that NIA had strongly opposed the plea, arguing that Khan played an “active role of doing recce of the victim and his way of travelling”, and that releasing him, even briefly, could endanger witnesses and risk tampering with evidence. The agency also described him as a flight risk.

Rejecting defence reliance on previous court orders granting interim bail for family functions, the court clarified that those cases, particularly the Bhima Koregaon-Elgar Parishad case, were “altogether different”, as “no murder was committed by anyone”.

In a detailed 11-page order, Judge Baviskar recounted the chain of events following Nupur Sharma’s remarks, observing that the incident had led to “outrage throughout the nation” and that the accused allegedly conspired to “avenge” the remarks by targeting individuals who had expressed support for Sharma on social media. The order records that Kolhe was “murdered by religiously radicalised persons” after sharing a WhatsApp post in support of Sharma.