The Supreme Court on Friday reserved its judgment on the petition filed by Kanchi Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswati seeking bail in the Sankararaman murder case.
A three-judge Bench, headed by Chief Justice R C Lahoti, heard defence counsel Fali S Nariman rebutting the arguments of the Tamil Nadu police for over an hour before reserving the order.
Nariman said if granted bail, the seer would not enter the mutt till the investigations in the case was complete.
The Tamil Nadu police had opposed bail to the seer saying that as most witnesses in the case were employees of the mutt, granting bail to the Shankaracharya would hinder the depositions against him.
Nariman also produced documents to point out loopholes in the police's claim that Rs 50 lakh had been paid to Sankararaman's assailants at the behest of the Shankaracharya.
The police first claimed that the money was drawn from three banks, including the ICICI. But they later said the Shankaracharya got the money from the sale of land. The amount was kept in his room since April till it was paid to the assailants, the police claimed.
But Nariman produced bank statements to show that the amount was deposited in two accounts in a bank on May 7, 2004, four months before the murder of Sankararaman on September 3.
Talking to newspersons after the hearing, Shankaracharya's advocate Krishan Kumar said the defence had given satisfactory explanation in the court to the police allegations.
"We have accounted for every single penny and we are hopeful that when the order comes it will be in favour of our client," Kumar said.
K T S Tulsi, senior SC advocate representing the Tamil Nadu police, told rediff.com that there was plenty of evidence against the pontiff. It was absurd to say that the seer had been framed in a fabricated case, he said.
With PTI inputs
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