Court holds autorickshaw driver, aide guilty in Jharkhand judge murder case

A special CBI court in Dhanbad on Thursday held autorickshaw driver Lakhan Verma and his accomplice Rahul Verma guilty in connection with Judge Uttam Anand murder case a year after he was killed.

The special CBI court Judge Rajnikant Pathak held Lakhan Verma and Rahul Verma guilty in connection with the murder of Additional Sessions Judge Anand on July 28 last year.

Trial in the murder case of judge Anand began in February this year.

The charges against the accused were framed under IPC sections 302 (murder), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false information to protect offender) and 34 (common intention).

The 49-year-old judge was run over by an autorickshaw while he was out on a morning jog on July 28, 2021.

CCTV camera footage showed that judge Anand was jogging on one side of a fairly wide road at Randhir Verma Chowk in Dhanbad when the auto-rickshaw veered towards him, hit him from behind and fled the scene, killing him.

The case was handed over to the CBI by the Jharkhand government.