Court acquits Sooraj Pancholi in Jiah Khan’s suicide case due to lack of evidence

A special CBI court on Friday (28 April) gave clean chit to actor Sooraj Pancholi on the charge of assisting Jiah Khan to commit suicide in 2013 due to lack of supporting evidence.

Judge A S Sayyed of the special CBI court in Mumbai pronounced Sooraj Pancholi ‘acquitted’ because there was insufficient evidence to support a conviction.

Jiah’s mother, Rabia Khan, responded to the verdict by saying that she would bring this matter to the High Court. “The accusation of aiding suicide has been dropped. But how did my child die? The High Court will be contacted in this case of murder, she stated.

Actress Jiah Khan, best known for her leading role in Amitabh Bachchan’s Nishabd, committed suicide on 3 June 2013, in her Juhu residence.

Actor Sooraj Pancholi was arrested on 11 June as a result of a six-page message written by the actor. Jiah wrote in the letter of the “trauma and abuse” she had experienced at the hands of her “lover”. Khan’s mother and other family members accused Sooraj of “not respecting Jiah” and “using foul language to hit her” after Khan died. Both Sooraj and his father, actor Aditya Pancholi, denied these charges.

Pancholi was charged under Section 306 (abetment of suicide) of the Indian Penal Code. The trial in the case started in 2019. The Central Bureau of Investigation examined 22 witnesses, including Khan’s mother, Rabia, and her sisters