MUMBAI: Vidhie Mukerjea, a key witness in the 2015 Sheena Bora murder trial, has made several claims such as forged statements in her name. She said, “If such forged statements have been recorded in my name, there must be an ulterior motive or mala fide intentions.” She further claimed that during her interactions with law enforcement, she was never alone but accompanied by various family members, including her stepfather Peter Mukerjea, his sister Shangon Das Gupta, and his son Rabin Mukerjea. According to Vidhie, these individuals “fed” information to investigating officers, making the recorded statements a combination of their inputs rather than her personal knowledge.The biological daughter of Indrani and co-accused Sanjeev Khanna, Vidhie also accused Peter Mukerjea’s sons Rahul and Rabin of siphoning her mother’s assets. She claimed that within 15 days of Indrani’s arrest, ancestral jewellery worth crores of rupees and over Rs 7 crore in bank savings were taken. She believes this happened with Peter’s knowledge and consent. “Rahul and Rabin took this jewellery much prior to the arrest of my father (in Nov 2015),” Vidhie deposed.She also alleged that money was transferred from Indrani’s ANZ Bank account without her permission. “At that time, Rahul was not working and Rabin was not in good financial condition. Rahul and Rabin had a clear motive to falsely implicate Indrani in the present offence and to ensure that she will not come out of prison. Indrani was left with no money to defend herself after her arrest,” she said.Vidhie claimed that Rabin even threatened her, saying, “Your mother has gone to prison for life, and she will never come out.”During her examination-in-chief by the prosecution, Vidhie described the initial relationship between Indrani and Sheena Bora as “amazing”. However, she said things changed with the arrival of Peter’s son Rahul and his romantic relationship with Sheena. She said disputes began when Rahul’s drug use and, subsequently Sheena’s, came to light.She maintained that Indrani’s “strictness” was an effort to mould them into respectable citizens and that her mother was never aggressive or violent. Vidhie also noted that she received an email from Sheena in 2013, a year after the alleged murder.Vidhie detailed the devastating impact of her parents’ arrest on her own life. She was left “penniless” and had no place to sleep after family members, including Rahul and his brother, moved the contents of her home. She claimed that on the day after her mother’s arrest, she was “disentitled” from her inheritance. Vidhie testified that Peter had a letter sent to the building society to stop the transfer of a flat in her name, which was meant to be her 18th birthday gift. She also discovered her name was removed from Peter’s will and that she was never legally adopted by him. Despite these “transgressions,” she stated, “I still love my father very much.”Vidhie described the period as the most “traumatic” of her life, with relatives fighting over her mother’s belongings while no one visited Indrani in jail. She alleged that Rabin pressured her to oppose her mother, making it “very clear” that she was either “with us against your mother or you are on your own”. She also claimed that relatives started fighting over which furniture would go to whose house, and shared her mother’s perfumes and bags among themselves.She alleged that she was “bombarded with lies and false accusations” against her mother by Rahul. Under this “wrong influence” and media reports, she wrote a book titled Devil’s Daughter. However, she no longer stands by its contents.The prosecution objected to the defence’s line of questioning about property and assets, but the judge overruled the objection. Indrani’s lawyer argued that these issues were relevant because the prosecution’s own theory was that Indrani was “over-ambitious and greedy” and how she opposed the relationship between Sheena and Rahul, while Peter supported it. The cross-examination will continue on Wednesday.
