Management students held guilty for murder of friend

Pune, Jun 11 (UNI) A local court today held two management students, Aditi Sharma and Praveen Khandelwal, guilty of murdering a friend by poisoning him, in a case of a love triangle turning nasty.

The quantum of sentence will be pronounced tomorrow.

The Additional Sessions Court Judge, S S Phansalkar-Joshi, based on testimonies of the victim's friend and the vicera report, held the two students guilty.

The incident had sent shock waves among students and college campuses in April last year. The accused Aditi (24) and Pravin (24), offered Shirdi Sai Baba's ''prasad'' laced with poison to their friend, Udit Bharti.

After consuming the prasad, Udit began vomitting and died after some time. The trio were from Jammu and had come to Pune for management studies.

Initially, Udit's death was registered as an accidental death due to food poisoning.

However, after the detailed vicera report, police registered a case of murder that pointed to a conspiracy.

Soon, police arrested Aditi and Praveen, under charges of murder and criminal conspiracy.

During the course of investigation, it was established that Aditi was in a relationship with Udit when they were studying Engineering in Jammu.

The two had even decided to marry after completing their management studies. But Aditi had a change of heart after meeting Praveen in the Management Institute and dumped Udit.

Both Aditi and Praveen moved to Gurgaon and worked for a private firm after their first year and even got engaged, upsetting Udit.

He never gave up on her and kept telling Aditi to stop meeting Praveen.

As the past relationship continued to haunt Aditi, she alongwith Praveen, hatched a conspiracy to kill Udit. The duo, after landing in Pune called Udit at a coffee house in Chinchwad and offered him ''prasad'' laced with arsenic.

Udit began vomiting soon after reaching his room in a nearby area.

However, before being shifted to hospital by his friends, Udit died.

The testimony by Udit's friends and the vicera report played an important role in the police investigation to establish the charges against Aditi and Praveen.

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