Days after an AIIMS team ruled out the murder angle in actor Sushant Singh Rajpur’s death, his family’s lawyer Vikas Singh challenged the report submitted by the hospital and raised a series of questions on the findings of the autopsy team.
Vikas Singh has now sent a letter to the CBI, which is probing the Sushant Singh Rajput Death case, asking them to answer several questions on the report submitted by the 6-member AIIMS team that ruled out murder in the death of Sushant Singh Rajput.
Sushant Singh Rajput was found dead on June 14 at his Mumbai apartment. Sushant Singh Rajput’s death was initially investigated by the Mumbai Police. However, after his family, being represented by Vikas Singh, raised questions over the Mumbai Police probe, the case was transferred to the CBI.
India Today TV asked the Mumbai autopsy team, which performed the post-mortem of the late actor, to answer some of these questions raised by Vikas Singh and here are the answers:
Q 1. Why was Sushant Singh Rajput’s post-mortem conducted after sundown on June 14? The same day he died?
A 1: Police officials came to us with the inquest and requested the post-mortem be done, so it was done at that hour. There is no rule that post-mortem cannot be performed at night. A circular issued in 2013 allows post-mortem at night.
Q 2. Did a magistrate authorise Sushant’s post-mortem after sundown?
A 2: A magistrate’s permission is only required in cases that are under Section 176 of CrPC, like custodial death, riots, etc. This case is under Section 174 of CrPC, where police have the powers to request for post-mortem and as per police’s inquest, post-mortem is done.
Q 3. Who all from Sushant Singh Rajput’s family were present during the post-mortem?
A 3: We don’t remember who all from the family were present during the post-mortem. Police came with Sushant Singh Rajput’s sister’s signed statement and requested the post-mortem. It was later on that Sushant Singh Rajput’s brother-in-law, ADG Haryana Police (OP Singh) and sister reached the post-mortem centre.
Q 4. Sushant’s post-mortem report mentions ligature marks. Why does it say no injuries?
A 4: If you go through Column 17 of the post-mortem report, ligature marks are mentioned and except that, there were no injuries.
Q 5. In case of an unnatural death like Sushant’s, the autopsy usually takes 2-3 hours. How was his completed in 90 minutes?
A 5: A general post-mortem takes a minimum of one hour, but there is no time limit as such. We performed the post-mortem in one and a half hours and preserved the viscera after examining the body.
Q 6: What are the findings on Sushant’s body which ruled out murder theory other than viscera report?
A 6: The body didn’t have any injury marks and there was no struggle seen in the room where Sushant Singh Rajput had hung himself. The ligature marks on the neck matched with the cloth used for hanging and fibre of the cloth was found on the neck as well.
Q 7: Some have raised doubts that the cloth couldn’t hold the weight of Sushant’s body.
A 7: The cloth which was a kurta belonging to Sushant Singh Rajput was sent for tensile test to the Kalina FSl, which gave its report that the cloth could bear upto 200 kgs of weight, thus ruling out the conspiracy theory.
Q 8. What about the time of death, why wasn’t it mentioned in the report?
A 8: The Mumbai Police had raised questions regarding the time of death and it was mentioned in the next detailed report that it was 10 to 12 hours before the post-mortem.
Q 9. What about the taser gun theory, he was tased using a taser gun and then strangulated?
A 9: Taser gun leaves a burn injury on the neck, these were ligature marks due to the hanging thus ruling out the taser gun theory being discussed and shared on social media.