Mumbai: In her testimony before the special CBI court on Thursday, Rabia Khan reiterated her claim that her daughter, actress Jiah Khan, was murdered by accused Suraj Pancholi. The prosecution on Thursday concluded Rabia’s examination-in-chief. She would now be cross-examined by Pancholi’s lawyer on Monday.
Rabia narrated the sequence of events of how she found Jiah after she died by suicide. “I took my phone and dialled the first number in my contact list. The first number was Anju Mahandru. I was screaming on the phone…Please come… my baby is gone,” she said.
“In ten minutes, Anju came running. The door was open and I was sitting holding my daughter tight, trying to keep her up against gravity. Moin Baig, who also came to the house, quickly helped free Jiah. At that moment I told Anju to look at the injuries. I said I had told her not to be with Suraj,” Rabia said.
“She said, Rabia shut up… it’s a suicide,” the witness said, adding, “No, my daughter will not do this… look at the injuries. She then pointed towards the urine and the droppings on the floor and started to clean that.”
Rabia told the court that Anju had asked her not to mention the names of Suraj or his father Aditya to the police. “Anju Mahendru told me not to take the name of Suraj as his father Aditya had a lot of contacts in the underworld and also political clout. They are very dangerous and can do anything to you,” Rabia said.
Rabia said that initially when the police began the probe, they also suspected foul play. She said the messages and pictures on Jiah’s phone were all deleted a day after Jiah’s death. She alleged that Jiah’s phone was tampered with.
The witness further told the court that from day one she had been insisting that it was not a case of suicide, but a murder considering the injuries she saw on her deceased daughter’s body.
Rabia had alleged that Suraj had physically and verbally abused Jiah on several occasions. She said that one of Jiah’s stylists later told the family that the actor had undergone an abortion also.
Rabia had been insisting that Jiah was killed and it was not a suicide. She had also filed a petition before the Bombay high court and the Supreme Court for reinvestigation into the case. It was only after, she expressed concerns, that the case was transferred to CBI. Pancholi, who was in a relationship with the 25-year-old actress, has been booked for abetment of suicide in the case. He is currently out on bail.
The actress was found dead at her residence in Mumbai on June 3, 2013, by her mother.
