Refuting the claims of two of the six December 16 Delhi gangrape case accused, the 23-year-old victim’s male friend on Monday told a special fast-court that both Mukesh and Vinay Sharma were in the bus when the incident took place.
The counsel for Mukesh contended before additional sessions judge Yogesh Khanna that Mukesh and Vinay were not involved in the gangrape and had neither beaten nor robbed the victims.
Vinay claimed that he was not in the bus that fateful night and was at a music function in South Delhi.
The victim’s friend, a 28-year-old software engineer, refuted the contentions of Mukesh and Vinay, saying he had identified the bus and even the accused who were present in it that night.
“It is wrong to suggest that accused Mukesh was not sitting on the driver’s seat when I entered the bus. I had already identified the accused who was sitting on the driver’s seat. It is wrong to suggest that accused Vinay was not present in the bus at the time of the incident,” the victim’s friend said.
The counsel also claimed that Mukesh has been falsely implicated at the instance of Delhi police and also because he is brother of the main accused Ram Singh.
The victim’s friend, however, refuted Mukesh’s contention and said, “It is wrong to suggest that Mukesh was shown to me by the police in the police station before Test Identification Parade (TIP) or for that reason I had identified him in the TIP... “... Or that the photographs of accused Mukesh were shown prior to the TIP or that I had framed him because he is brother of accused Ram Singh (dead) or that he was framed at the instance of the police or that Mukesh was the only person among the accused person who knew driving.” The defence counsel said the victim’s friend was deposing falsely as it not possible for a vehicle driver to change his seat when the bus was moving at high speed.
Meanwhile, the court directed that the medical report of accused Vinay, who is not keeping well since May 6, be submitted by the concerned hospital by Tuesday.