Police photographer Chunni Lal Gautam,who was the first to take pictures of the Noida home of dentist couple Rajesh and Nupur Talwar after the discovery of the body of their 14-year-old daughter Arushi,told a Ghaziabad court Friday that he had seen blood spattered on the walls of Arushis room but no stains on the dolls around her bed or on the sheets,lawyers said after the trial got underway. The CBI had earlier claimed that the crime scene had been dressed up by Rajesh,a charge that the Talwars had rejected. Arushi was murdered on the night of May 15-16,2008. She was found dead in bed with her throat slit and injuries on the head. At first,the needle of suspicion pointed towards domestic help Hemraj who was missing. A day later,his body was found on the terrace of the house. Last month,charges were framed against the Talwar couple for the murder of Arushi and Hemraj. On Friday,the CBI examined three witnesses photographer Chunni Lal,forensic expert A D Saha and UP electricity department official Rajesh Kumar. According to lawyers present in the court ,Kumars testimony was sought to clarify the CBI stand about the Internet router at the Talwar home being switched on and off on the night of the incident. According to CBI,the router was used for the last time at 12.08 am on May 16,then showed activity in small intervals till 3.43 am when it was switched off. It was switched on again at 6.01 am. This switching on and off,the CBI maintains,can happen only if a person does it or if electricity to the house falters. Lawyers said Kumar told the court that as per the electricity logs,there was no power cut in the house between 6 pm on May 15 and 7 am on May 16. This would seem to support the CBI stand that a person had to have been awake that night. The Talwars have all along maintained that they were asleep while the murders took place. A D Saha,Senior Scientific Officer of the Central Forensic Science Laboratory,told the court that the CFSL had submitted 36 articles seized during investigations,including a Scotch whisky bottle,golf stick and club,pillow,Arushis mobile phone and other articles from the Talwar house. The CBI had said that no fingerprints could be recovered from the whisky bottle on the dining table since gloves had been used. The Talwars,on the other hand,claimed that fingerprints were recovered from the bottle but these did not belong to either of them. Saha told the court that the CFSL,with the help of aluminium powder,was able to lift five sets of fingerprints. He did not say who the fingerprints belonged to. The trial will resume on June 21,the next date set by the court.
