Nithari key witness does U-turn

New Delhi: Yet another twist was added to the gruesome Nithari serial killings case on Thursday when a key witness in the case, Nand Lal, retracted his statement in a special CBI court hearing the case.

Nand Lal, whose daughter Payal’s remains were found in Nithari, gave a clean chit to key accused Moninder Singh Pandher and the then Circle Officer of Noida Dinesh Yadav.

Nand Lal had made three points earlier and retracted all in the cross-examination on Thursday.

Nadnlal had said, "I was present when the police had first quizzed Moninder Singh Pandher and he had taken the police to an area beside his house from where the big knife (Aari) was recovered by the police." On Thursday, he said Pandher did not talk about any weapon.

Nand Lal had said that Pandher's manager SK Sharma had bribed Dinesh Yadav in his presence. On Thursday, he said no such incident had taken place.

Nand Lal had also said in the court that few pages of the case diary were torn in his presence. On Thursday, he denied this, too.

This is the second U-turn in the sensational case.

On October 24, one of the prime accused in the case, Surinder Koli, too, had gone back on his statement.

After defending his employer for nine months, Koli also said that Pandher tried to get him killed.

This statement was a complete volte-face from Koli’s earlier confession, in which he had nearly all but absolved Pandher of the crimes. Both Koli and Pandher have been charged by the CBI with rape and murder.

Pandher was arrested along with Koli after police recovered human skulls and body parts stuffed in 57 polythene bags from the sewer behind their bungalow on December 29, 2006.

Pandher and Koli are currently lodged in Ghaziabad's Dasna jail.

The CBI, which took over the case from Noida Police, had cleared Pandher after no evidence was found against him.

The CBI had said, Koli had allegedly raped and killed 20 children and young women, while Pandher was just charged under the provisions of the Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act.

In his earlier statement to the police, Nand Lal had said that Pandher had shown the weapon of offence during interrogation in his presence. On Thursday, Nand Lal said in court that Pandher did not talk about any weapon. Pandher is alleged to have severed the limbs of children with the weapon.

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