Aarushi murder: Talwars' fifth witness records statement

Ghaziabad, July 20: A defence witness in the Aarushi murder case on Friday told the special CBI court here that the day Aarushi was found dead, he and three others went to terrace of an adjacent house to dump mattress and ice slabs, but did not notice the body of domestic help Hemraj.

Vikas Sethi, Talwars' compounder and their fifth witness yesterday deposed before the court. Sethi said he along with clinic staff of Talwars went to terrace of Punish Raj Tandon's house, whose house's walls were attached with Talwars' house, to dump the mattress and ice slabs, "but didn't see towards Rajesh's house terrace".

The compounder earlier claimed that the walls of Tandon and Rajesh's residences were not joined, but later said that walls of terrace were joined with each other and he was not sure that there was some iron grills between two terrace or not.

On the other hand, CBI lawyer RK Saini said that despite terrace walls of Tandon and Rajesh's residence were attached to each other, it was not possible that Sethi would not have paid attention towards Talwars' house roof where Hemraj's body had been found in a pool of blood on May 17, 2008.

Sethi also said that he did not try to put mattress and ice slabs from Tandon's house to Rajesh's residence terrace. The witness also told the court that he had been booked in a video piracy case at Vikas Puri Police Station in Delhi and spent some days in Tihar Jail. "It is wrong to say that having criminal background, Talwars called me to clean house," added Sethi.

Sethi also told the court that he had cleaned the house on police's instruction. "A woman asked me to clean Talwars' house on the day Aarushi's body was found, but I cannot tell about her identity as I did not know who she was. I got permission from police personnel and a lady constable present there and they allowed me to clean the house.

"I also got permission from police personnel to put Aarushi's room mattress on the terrace. One part of mattress was cut, blanket and some bedsheets were placed on it at that time," Sethi told court.

PTI