Exclusive | BBlunt executive murder: Two get life term

Six years after the murder of salon executive Kirti Vyas, the sessions court sentenced Siddhesh Tamhankar and Khushi Sahjwani to life imprisonment on Tuesday. The court found both accused guilty of murder, stating that charges against them were proven.

The accused, Khushi Sahjwani and Siddhesh Tamhankar broke down in court after Judge M G Deshpande announced the verdict. Sahjwani, who was on bail, said she thought she would walk free due to the lack of evidence. She noted that none of the witnesses who testified had seen her or Tamhankar with Vyas on the day she went missing.

Accused Siddhesh Tamhankar outside the sessions court on May 28. Pic/Shadab Khan

On hearing his sentence, Tamhankar, 42, shed tears. Speaking with mid-day in the courthouse corridor, he said, "What can I say? I don't know why I was arrested and incarcerated for almost seven years. I have not done anything and never had any problem with Vyas. The police found nothing in my case, and 1.5 months later, suddenly there was a blood sample found inside Sahjwani's car, and we were arrested. The police manipulated everything to frame us because the case was never solved. They made us scapegoats despite having no proof against us. I had faith in the judiciary, and now we will approach the higher court," he said, wiping his tears.

‘My biggest mistake…'

Tamhankar added, "The police claim that I picked her up from her residence, but there is no evidence of this. In fact, it was I who told the cops that on March 16, the day Vyas went missing, I was at HDFC Bank at Grant Road to get some documents for my passport. While I was going to the bank with Sahjwani, I saw Vyas and said hi to her. I used to call her ‘mom.' I asked her, ‘Mom, where are you going? I am also going to the office, come with us'. She said she was getting late and needed to reach the office early, so we turned near the bank and dropped her near Grant Road station. Later in the evening, when I found out she hadn't returned, I messaged her, asking, ‘Mom, where are you? Your phone is not reachable'. I told the cops that I dropped her at the station in the morning. That was my biggest mistake, and today I am convicted in the case."

‘Where is the justice?'

Asked about the show-cause notice Vyas had issued to him for poor performance, which the police claim was a motive for the murder, he said, "I was about to complete five years with the organisation. My reporting manager was someone else, not Vyas," he said, pointing to another person in the court whom he claimed was his manager. "How would Vyas's show-cause notice impact me to the extent I would end up killing her? Is there any logic to that? I was helping the cops at DB Marg in their probe. Suddenly, the case was transferred to the Crime Branch, and they found blood stains after 1.5 months, and we were arrested. I am telling you, read the documents."

Sahjwani said, "How can you charge us with murder when there is no dead body? In the Divya Pahuja case, she went missing but her body was later found. In this case, there is no body. There are 39 witnesses, and none of them testified that they saw us with Vyas. Why would we kill her when there was no enmity between us? I worked at the same salon for several years. There was absolutely no problem between us; you can ask anyone there."

The family members of both accused, who were present in court, also broke down after the court's order. "I thought that after six years my brother would walk free and we would take him home, but the court's decision was unexpected. We were hopeful as there was no evidence against him, only the blood samples, which we believe were manipulated. I know my brother, and I asked him many times about Vyas. He explained everything to me, and I trusted him. There is no reason he would have killed her," said Tamhankar's sister Sichita.

The case

Vyas, who was a resident of Grant Road was working with BBlunt salon in Andheri as an executive in the accounts department. She was a charted accountant and law graduate. She went missing on March 16, 2018, while on her way to her office. The DB Marg initially investigated the matter before it was transferred to the Mumbai Crime Branch, the then-Joint Commissioner of Crime Sanjay Saxena formed a special team to look into the case. The crime branch initially had doubts about both the accused. The crime branch took the help of the Kalina Forensic Laboratory staffers, who found blood stains in Sahjwani's car after 1.5 months.

Kirti Vyas, the salon chain executive who was last seen six years ago

The stains matched blood samples of Vyas's parents and the accused were arrested by the Crime Branch who later confessed to the cops that they had killed Vyas in a moving car and later dumped her body in a creek near Mahul in Chembur. The Crime Branch made all possible attempts to trace her body for several days and even used drones but it has not been found. The court convicted the accused on Monday under Indian Penal Code Sections 302 (murder) 364 (kidnapping) 201 (destruction of evidence) and 341 (wrongful restraint).

Official Speak

Public Prosecutor Raja Thakare said, "It was a challenging case since the body was not available, but there was strong circumstantial evidence against the accused. The CCTV footage showed they were last seen with her, and the call detail reports were incriminating. The final piece of evidence was the blood stains found inside the car of one of the accused, which played a crucial role in securing the conviction. We were very confident despite the unavailability of the body, and we correctly cited a Supreme Court order before the court. I believe the court has considered all aspects of the case. I have not read the full order yet, but the judgment is satisfying."

According to the prosecution, Vyas had handed a show-cause notice to accused Tamhankar over his "poor performance", and he had asked her to retract it, even the day before she went missing. The police claimed that the organisation was looking for Tamhankar's replacement, which he did not like. Tamhankar, who was also having an affair with Sahjwani, who was already married to someone else, never wanted Vyas to reveal this to anyone, according to the police. The cops cited these two possible reasons for Tamhankar strangling her on March 16 after picking her up from her residence in the Sahjwani's car, promising to discuss the show-cause notice and drop her at Grant Road railway station.

Lakhmi Gautam, joint commissioner, crime, said, "The evidence was supported by very strong circumstantial grounds, leaving no probability of anyone else's involvement." Police Inspector Sachin Mane, the investigating officer of the case, said, "The accused played smart initially, never revealing to anyone that they picked up Vyas from her residence until her family started scanning CCTV footage. He got scared and informed his boss about picking her up from her residence the day she went missing. That was the first breakthrough. When we started scanning the call detail records, we found that the phone of the deceased was turned off near Jijamata Nagar, Worli, and at the same time, the car was there according to CCTV footage. This is not a coincidence. When we found bloodstains in the car that matched with the DNA of the deceased's parents, we arrested the accused."

The case that shook Mumbai

Kirti Vyas, a finance manager of the salon chain, left home on the morning of March 16, 2018, never to return. She was last seen by eye-witnesses getting into a car owned by the two accused.

The investigation showed Vyas was on the verge of terminating the two accused, Siddhesh Tamhankar and Khushi Sahjwani.

Though Vyas's body was never found, the police made their case based on call data and circumstantial evidence, including blood stains found inside the car that was matched with Vyas's parents.

Mar 16
Day in 2018 when Vyas went missing