NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Tuesday began hearing on day-to-day basis arguments on the appeal against acquittal of Santosh Kumar Singh, son of a retired Delhi Police officer, in the Priyadarshini Mattoo murder case.

Beginning the argument, Additional Solicitor-General Amarendra Sharan submitted before a Division Bench of the Court comprising Justice R.S. Sodhi and P.K. Bhasin that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had sufficient evidence to show to the Court that the trial court had been wrong in acquitting the accused in the case.

The trial court had also agreed to the authenticity of evidence collected by the investigating agency except the DNA test and the forensic examination of pieces of the visor of the helmet of the accused. The investigating agency had collected the pieces of the visor from the residential premises of the victim where the incident had taken place.

Mr. Sharan stated that the trial court had rejected the DNA findings holding the accused guilty of sexually assaulting the victim on the specious ground that the blood sample taken from the accused was of a lesser quantity when it the reached the Hyderabad forensic laboratory for examination.

He further submitted that part of the blood sample had evaporated during its transportation from Delhi to Hyderabad by air.

In support of the charge that the accused had been stalking the victim before the fateful day, Mr. Sharan said the victim had lodged several complaints between 1994 and 1996 with the Maurice Nagar police in North Delhi against the accused for intimidating and harassing, and the accused had given written apologies to the police that he would desist from indulging in such activities in future.

The investigating agency had submitted copies of the complaints as well as the apologies to the court during the trial.

Mr. Sharan will continue his argument on Wednesday.

The Court took up the appeal for an out-of-turn hearing on an application by the father of the victim.

A Delhi court had in December 1999 acquitted the accused.

Priyadarshini Mattoo, a law student at the Campus Law Centre of Delhi University, was raped and then strangulated to death on the evening of January 23, 1996, at her residence in Vasant Kunj in South Delhi.

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