Hema Upadhyay case: 2 artist friends of Chintan say their statements not taken

Two artist friends of Chintan Upadhyay, and accused in the double murder case of artist Hema Upadhyay and her lawyer Harish Bhambhani are in judicial custody.

On Friday the duo filed an affidavit of their statement before the court. In the affidavit Vapi-based artist Nitesh aka Somu M. Desai, informed the court that the police never took his statement while he was the one who had arranged a conversation between Chintan and the main accused Vidhyadhar — as both had not spoken to each other for ages — for their installation work. Another friend Amir Rizvi claimed that the police is hiding a few statements and a few things were not put on record.

In the affidavit (to which The Asian Age has access) Mr Desai mentioned that from July to September 2015, he was working on a trophy for mass production, and contacted Vidhyadhar as he had worked with many artists before. In between this, on August 6, Mr Desai casually mentioned Vidhyadhar to Chintan and for the first time after a gap of about four years, he made Chintan talk to Vidhyadhar in which Chintan advised Vidhyadhar to work sincerely. According to Mr Desai’s statement to court, which was put up on the board on Friday, he had mentioned that he had visited Vidhyadhar’s workshop in Laljipada a few times and every time he found debtors approaching Vidhyadhar and he learnt that Vidhyadhar was in heavy debt. Most of his belongings were taken away by people to whom he owed money and so his commissioned work was getting affected.

According to Mr Desai during a conversation, Vidhyadhar had informed him that he owed some money to Hema Upadhyay and she was very rude while demanding this money from him.

The affidavit also mentions Mr Panchal, a worker at Vidhydhar’s studio, who left the studio at 7.30 pm on December 11 (the day of the murder) and another day after coming to studio he saw multiple abrasions/ scratch marks on Vidhyadhar’s face.

Mr Rizvi, another friend, stated Chintan was ready to pay Rs 2.5 crore, the cost of the flat, to Hema after three meetings between them. The affidavit also states that Hema’s temperament would change while dealing with subordinates.