Aarushi murder: Hemraj's wife moves Supreme Court challenging Talwar couple's acquittal

New Delhi: The acquittal of dentist couple Rajesh and Nupur Talwar in the 2008 twin murder case of their daughter Aarushi and domestic help Hemraj has been challenged in the Supreme Court. The plea, filed by Hemraj's wife, is the first petition in the top court against the Allahabad High Court verdict of October 12 this year acquitting the couple.

The High Court had freed them of the charges on the ground that they could not be held guilty on the basis of the evidence on record. A CBI court at Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh had sentenced the Talwars to life imprisonment on November 26, 2013 in connection with the case.

Before the high court's order came, Rajesh and Nupur Talwar were serving their life sentence in Ghaziabad's Dasna jail. Fourteen-year-old Aarushi was found dead inside her room in the Talwars' Noida residence with her throat slit in May 2008.

The needle of suspicion had initially moved towards 45- year-old Hemraj, who had gone missing but his body was recovered from the terrace of the house two days later. As the Uttar Pradesh Police drew flak over a shoddy probe into the case which was making national headlines, then chief minister Mayawati had recommended a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). The case was handed over to the CBI. Aarushi Talwar a 13-year-old student at Delhi Public School. She and her dentist parents Dr Rajesh and Dr Nupur Talwar lived in an apartment in Sector 25 (Jalvayu Vihar) of Noida, Uttar Pradesh.

The Talwars practiced together at their clinic in Sector 27 of Noida. They also saw patients at the Fortis Hospital, where Rajesh Talwar headed the dental department. In addition, Rajesh taught at the ITS dental college in Greater Noida.

Yam Prasad Banjade, better known as Hemraj, was the Talwar family's live-in domestic help and cook. He belonged to a family of Dharapani village in Arghakhanchi district of Nepal.