Former television producer Suhaib Ilyasi, host of the once popular 90s television serial ‘India’s Most Wanted’, was sentenced to life on Wednesday for murdering his wife Anju Ilyasi 17 years ago.
A Delhi sessions court had convicted Suhaib of the crime on December 16 based on a case filed by his mother-in-law Rukma Singh.
As a part of the sentence, additional sessions judge SK Malhotra also imposed a fine of Rs 2 lakh on Suhaib and ordered that Rs 10 lakh compensation be paid to Anju’s parents.
Anju was found dead in her east Delhi residence with multiple stab injuries in January, 2000. Suhaib told the police that she had committed suicide after an argument.
Following the conviction, advocate Satender Sharma, Rukma Singh’s counsel, said, “The trial court has convicted Suhaib Ilyasi for his wife’s murder. The section 302 (murder) was added after the Supreme Court dismissed Suhaib Ilyasi’s appeal challenging the Delhi high court (HC) order of inclusion of section 302 in the case.”
Suhaib was arrested on March 28, 2000, after charges of dowry were added to the case based on his sister-in-law Rashmi Singh and mother-in-law Rukma alleging that Anju was tortured and harassed for dowry.
Later, Rukma moved an application in the trial court seeking inclusion of murder charges against Suhaib but it was dismissed in 2011. She then moved the high court, which ordered framing of murder charges against Suhaib in August 2014.
Suhaib then approached the Supreme Court challenging the HC ruling but the apex court dismissed his plea.