The Bombay high court on September 28 slammed Rabia Khan, mother of late actress Jiah Khan, for filing repeated proceedings in court, saying that she was procrastinating the ongoing trial in the suicide case. Justices Ajay Gadkari and Milind Jadhav said, “The entire approach of the petitioner appears to be to procure an order from this court, without facing trial, that the death of the victim was homicidal and not suicidal. This kind of approach appears to circumvent the due process of law.”
On June 3, 2013, Rabia had found daughter Jiah hanging from the ceiling fan in her bedroom. Rabia insisted that Jiah was murdered. Sooraj Pancholi is being tried for abetment to Jiah’s suicide. Rabia moved the high court after the CBI court rejected her plea for further probe by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) into Jiah’s death. On September 12, 2022, Justices Ajay Gadkari and Milind Jadhav dismissed her appeal.
The judges also refused to countenance “a legal review report” by UK-based law firm SCARMANS, which alleged discrepancies/lacunae in the CBI’s investigations. “We are aghast and shocked to read the said report… this report attempts to deliver a verdict even before the trial is over,” they said. They also mentioned that the investigations had shown that Jiah’s death was suicidal and not homicidal.