Udupi: After four years in jail, Niranjan Bhat, one of the accused in the sensational murder case of hotelier and entrepreneur Bhaskar Shetty has been granted conditional interim bail by District and Sessions court, here on Wednesday, June 24.
The development comes after Srinivas Bhat (65), father of accused Niranjan Bhat died due to severe depression died two days ago.
The deceased Srinivas Bhat as well as Niranjan Bhat’s driver Raghavendra were also detained in the case on the charges of destroying evidence, but they both were released within a month.
Due to the death of Niranjan’s father, his lawyer had appealed to the District and Sessions Court to grant bail to the accused in order to carry out the after death religious rituals of his deceased father.
The court, after hearing the arguments of the lawyers granted the conditional interim bail today till July 7 and asked Niranjan Bhat to furnish a personal bond of Rs 5,00,000.
The prime and first accused in the murder case, his wife Rajeshwari Shetty is already out of bail. The second accused- Navaneet Shetty, son of deceased Bhaskar Shetty is still in prison.
Gulabi Shetty, mother of deceased Bhaskar Shetty had filed a missing complaint with Udupi Police about her son in 2016.
The police arrested his wife Rajeshwari, her son Navaneeth and astrologer Niranjan Bhat on the charge of murdering Bhaskar Shetty in Udupi on August 7, 2016.
It is said that Rajeshwari, her son and Bhat charred Bhaskar Shetty to death in a sacred fire pit.
