A court in Assam’s Guwahati on Friday rejected the petition for bail filed by a musician and two personal security officers accused in the death of singer Zubeen Garg, PTI reported.
While the musician, Amritprava Mahanta, had been charged with murder in the case, the two personal security officers, Nandeswar Borah and Paresh Baishya, were charged with criminal conspiracy and criminal breach of trust, The Indian Express reported.
Special Public Prosecutor Ziaul Kamar told PTI that the matter has been listed for further hearing on February 13.
Garg, a renowned Assamese singer, died on September 19 during a yacht trip in Singapore, a day before he was scheduled to perform at the North East India Festival there.
A death certificate issued by the authorities in Singapore on September 20 stated the cause of Garg’s death as drowning.The authorities reiterated the findings in October and December.
On January 14, the authorities in the southeast Asian country also said that Garg was “severely intoxicated” and had refused to wear a life jacket when he drowned while swimming in September.
However, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has repeatedly claimed that the singer’s death was not accidental but was a murder.
The event where Garg was scheduled to perform had been organised by the Indian government and the Indian High Commission in Singapore, with support from the Assam Association and the North East India Association in the country.
Seven persons were arrested in connection with the singer’s death. A Special Investigation Team in India formed to look into the case filed a chargesheet in a Guwahati court on December 12, accusing four of the seven persons of murder.
The four persons charged for murder were Shyamkanu Mahanta, who was the organiser of the North East India Festival, Garg’s manager Siddharatha Sharma and two musicians who were with the singer on the yacht – Shekharjyoti Goswami and Amritprava Mahanta.
Besides, Zubeen Garg’s cousin, Deputy Superintendent of Police Sandipan Garg, who had travelled with him to Singapore, was charged with culpable homicide not amounting to murder, while two of his personal security officers, Borah and Baishya, were accused of criminal breach of trust.
On Friday, while rejecting Amritprava Mahanta’s bail petition on Friday, the Kamrup Metropolitan District and Sessions Court said that the charges laid against her were punishable with death or imprisonment for life.
The judge added that the argument submitted by the prosecution reflected “a prima facie case against Mahanta for conspiracy with prime accused persons in connection with this case and actively participating in that conspiracy, which facilitated the death of Zubeen Garg”.
In the chargesheet filed in the matter, Amritprava Mahanta was accused of “causing excessive drinking of alcohol by the victim” and “not informing his additional consumption of alcohol and him being sleep and food deprived to the manager of the victim or to the organiser or to the wife of the victim”, The Indian Express reported.
The chargesheet also accused the musician of “encouraging” Zubeen Garg to swim without a life jacket in that condition.
Amritprava Mahanta, in her petition for bail, submitted that the “investigation has already been completed and the chargesheet has been submitted, and there is no whisper of allegation which constitutes any offence under any provision of law” against her, the newspaper reported.
Her petition also noted that an allegation against her was that she had not prevented Zubeen Garg from swimming without a life jacket.
“It is submitted that ‘omission’ is not a criminal offence,” The Indian Express quoted her as saying. “It is submitted that no overt act has been attributed to the accused person….prosecution has failed to explain the role of the accused person and in which manner, she has conspired with other co-accused in connection with the death of Zubeen Garg”.
The judge, while rejecting the applications of the Borah and Baishya, also stated that “it appears” that they “conspired with the prime accused to misappropriate the money which actually belongs to deceased”.
The court added that their offences were “serious in nature which have ramification in the society”.
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