Mumbai: A sessions court in Mumbai on Saturday, January 31, convicted Shree Jogdhankar for the murder of 19-year-old Jhanvi Kukreja, a Khar resident with whom he was reportedly in a relationship. The conviction relates to a fatal incident that occurred during a New Year’s Eve gathering in 2021. Jogdhankar has been sentenced to life imprisonment along with a fine of Rs 25,000.
The court acquitted Kukreja’s friend Diya Padalkar, extending her the benefit of the doubt. Additional Sessions Judge Satyanarayan Navandar declared Jogdhankar guilty of murder under applicable sections of the Indian Penal Code.
Details of the Case
Jhanvi Kukreja, who was studying psychology, had attended a New Year’s Eve party at Bhawati Heights on December 31, 2020. In the early morning hours of January 1, 2021, she was discovered lying in a pool of blood near a staircase on the premises. The post-mortem examination revealed 48 injuries on her body.
After conducting an investigation, police took Shree Jogdhankar and Diya Padalkar into custody, both of whom had been present at the party. Padalkar was acquainted with the victim, as the two had grown up in the same neighbourhood. Police had previously alleged that Jogdhankar and Padalkar assaulted and killed Kukreja on the terrace of a building, then dragged her body down the stairs from the fifth floor, as reported by PTI. Authorities had claimed the altercation stemmed from Jogdhankar’s alleged intimacy with Padalkar.
The prosecution had informed the court that DNA evidence conclusively demonstrated Jogdhankar’s presence at the crime scene and that Padalkar had come into contact with blood-stained items in the flat where she stayed following the incident.
The defence challenged the prosecution’s narrative, contending that the case relied entirely on circumstantial evidence that did not satisfy the standard of proof necessary for a conviction. Jogdhankar’s lawyer argued that the injuries he received resulted from the altercation that took place at that time.
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