SC postpones contempt case verdict against Nihita

SC postpones contempt case verdict against Nihita

Nepal's Supreme Court Monday postponed its verdict on a 'contempt of court' case against Nihita Biswas, the "wife" of Charles Sobhraj and her mother following their outbursts against its decision to uphold the life sentence of the 'bikini killer'.

Earlier, a division bench of Justices Balaram K.C and Ram Kumar Prasad Shah had set 20^th September  as the date for final verdict on the case against 22-year-old Nihita and Shankuntala Thapa, who was also Sobhraj's laywer.

The top court to postpone the verdict to 27^th September, the NepalNews online said. On 1^st August, the apex court ordered Nihita and her mother to appear before it for publicly criticising its judges.

They had accused the judges of corruption following the final verdict in the case on 30^th July which dashed Sobhraj's hope for freedom.

The court's directive came in response to a petition filed by advocates Rajan Adhikari and Shanta Sedhain, who accused the duo of contempt of court. Justice Shah was one of the two judges who announced the verdict in the 1975 sensational murder case of American tourist Connie Jo Bronzich.

After hearing the final verdict upholding the life imprisonment for Sobhraj, Biswas and Thapa had abused the judges, saying they took bribe and gave biased judgment.

"How can you convict a person without any evidence?" Thapa asked. "We provided all the evidence necessary to prove that he is not guilty. They simply did not look at the facts," she claimed, adding her client was "denied" justice.

Many television channels had recorded the outbursts by Thapa and Biswas against the apex court.

If convicted for contempt of court, they face one year imprisonment and/or Rs.10,000 fine as punishment if their explanations were not found satisfactory.

66-year-old Sobhraj, a French national whose father was an Indian and mother a Vietnamese, was sentenced by the lower courts to a 20-year life term for the murder of Bronzich and one year jail and Rs 2,000 fine in the fake passport case. He has already spent seven years in prison.

The trial has been splashed in the international media after Sobhraj announced his engagement and then marriage, while inside prison, to Nihita in 2008.

Sobhraj fell in love with the Nepali beauty when she met him to apply for a job as a translator.

Nicknamed the "Bikini killer" and "Serpent", he has been accused of luring young women and killing many of them. Sobhraj, who was earlier held in New Delhi's Tihar prison, was deported to France in 1997.