Sheena Bora case: Defence accuses witness of cheating Indrani

Kajal Sharma, a witness in the Sheena Bora murder case, cheated Indrani Mukerjea by forging the latter's signature and withdrawing money from her account, defence lawyers claimed in court today.

Sharma, a former personal secretary of Mukerjea, was being cross-examined by defence lawyers before special judge J C Jagdale.

Earlier, Sharma told the CBI that Mukerjea had forced her to forge Sheena Bora's signature on a resignation letter and on a letter seeking cancellation of Sheena's leave and licence agreement with her employer. This purportedly happened after Sheena's death.

However, today, the defence claimed that Sharma did not forge Sheena's signature.

Instead, she had cheated Mukerjea by forging the latter's signature on cheques and withdrawing money from her bank account, the defence lawyers claimed.

Denying these allegations, Sharma said she had only copied Sheena's signature at the instruction of Indrani Mukerjea.

Replying to a question, Sharma said that she had deleted a few e-mails of Mukerjea in which the latter had asked Sharma to practise Sheena's signature and send a scanned copy for her approval.

"I deleted a few e-mails on Indrani's instruction. I haven't done anything wrong. I didn't know that Sheena was not alive. I blindly followed my boss's instruction. It's not correct that I tried to destroy evidence," she said.

Sharma claimed that she did not know that copying someone's signature was wrong except with respect to property papers.

The defence questioned her, that if she did not think it was wrong, then why did she initially refuse to forge Sheena's signature.

"I had initially refused to copy because I didn't know where Sheena was and why should I copy her signature. I was not aware that Sheena was not alive. I signed it later as I was told (by Indrani) that Sheena was in the US and she did not have internet facility there," she said.

She further said, the second document was a leave and licence agreement.

It was not a proper property document as it was not on stamp paper.

Sheena (24), Indrani's daughter from an earlier relationship, was killed in April 2012, but the killing came to light in August 2015 after Mukerjea's driver Shyamvar Rai, arrested in another case, revealed it.

The Mumbai Police arrested Indrani, her former husband Sanjeev Khanna and Rai for allegedly killing Sheena.

Later, Indrani's husband and media baron Peter Mukerjea was also arrested for allegedly being part of the conspiracy.

The CBI, which took over the case, claimed that a financial dispute was the reason for the murder.