The Bombay High Court on Wednesday discharged Rahul Raj Singh, accused in the suicide case of actor Pratyusha Banerjee in 2016. Banerjee, who played the lead role in the television show Balika Vadhu, died by suicide at her rented apartment in Goregaon (West) on April 1, 2016.

Rahul Raj Singh was booked on charges of abetting her suicide and was granted anticipatory bail by the Bombay High Court in July 2016. He moved the Sessions Court with a discharge plea after the Bangur Nagar Police submitted a chargesheet in 2018.

While Singh claimed that the couple was planning to get married in December 2016, Pratyusha Banerjee was deeply disturbed because of her mother’s constant interference in her affairs.

Story continues below.
Subscribe to see fewer ads.

The Dindoshi Sessions Court in the western suburbs rejected his discharge plea in August 2023, prompting him to challenge the order at the High Court.

The Sessions Court, while refusing relief to Rahul Raj Singh, had observed that statements of witnesses prima facie showed the accused had made the life of the deceased a “living hell” and it was the harassment by the accused that made Banerjee take her own life.

However, a single-judge bench of Justice Shivkumar G Dige of the HC relied on submissions by senior advocate Aabad Ponda and advocate Shreyans Mithare for Singh that the last conversation between him and the deceased reflected that he tried to convince her not to take any drastic or extreme step while he was on his way to meet her; therefore, there was no case of abetment against him.

As per the lawyers, the last conversation showed the deceased blamed everyone, including her parents, for taking the drastic step. Singh’s lawyers also questioned the haste in the lodging of an FIR against the applicant without any suicide note, stating that allowing a trial in the case against him would result in an “abuse of process.” The HC allowed the revision plea, and the detailed order will be made available in due course.