Sooraj Pancholi’s bail hearing adjourned

Suraj Pancholi who was remanded in custody, filed for bail application, but he will have to spend the next few days in custody as the court today adjourned the hearing of his bail application to 21 June.
Suraj, son of actor Aditya Pancholi and Zarina Wahab, was taken into police custody for questioning in connection with the suicide of actress Jiah Khan. The 25 year old actress had made her debut in Ram Gopal Verma’s Nishabd against Amitabh Bachchan where she played the role of a teenager in love with her friend’s much older father. Since then, she had made only small appearances, the last being in Housefull in 2010. So, when Jiah hanged herself in her Juhu residence while her mother and sister had gone out, it was speculated that she was suffering from work related depression because her Bollywood career had stalled. However, her mother, Rabiya discovered a six pages letter among her belongings which she turned over to the police. Based on this letter where Jiah talks about her less than happy personal life, police took Suraj Pancholi into custody for questioning. Suraj was Jiah’s boyfriend and Jiah’s letter accuses him of infidelity, rape and torture.
However, the court had remanded Suraj to judicial custody as it said that no new evidence has been provided to keep him in police custody. This left Suraj free to file for bail which he did. His advocated Zameer Khan filed a bail application which ran as follows:
“The main evidence against my client is the only six-page letter which the police claim is written by Jiah. But how can Jiah write a six-page letter before she decides to commit suicide. Further, the police say that the letter was addressed to Suraj, but the letter nowhere mentions Suraj’s name. Also the letter does not have a signature, thus there is no authenticity and author to the alleged letter. Hence, the alleged letter cannot be taken as gospel truth and that the complainant is allegedly misusing the letter as she has no case whatsoever and only taking out revenge for the reasons best known to her. She wants to destroy the career and reputation of my client.”
Though no names have been mentioned in the letter, Jiah wrote "If I stay here, I will crave you and miss you." which points towards a romantic relationship. Her last call some time before death was also to Suraj.