Spare me this ordeal,Neeraj’s father tells court

Amarnath lives in Kanpur with his wife and a daughter. His was the first testimony recorded in the murder trial.

Neeraj Grover,an executive producer with a TV production house,had been stabbed and his body cut into several pieces on May 7,allegedly by Kannada actress Maria Susairaj and her naval officer boyfriend Emile Jerome Mathew. The body was then burned in the Manor jungles on the outskirts of the city.

Since Neeraj had moved to Mumbai,the calls to his father had been routine. “We would call up each other in the morning and before bedtime. When Neeraj broke the routine for the first time,it upset me,” said Amarnath.

Amarnath could not spell out when the news of Neeraj’s death was broken to him. “We were and still are in a very traumatic state of mind. I can’t recollect which day the police summoned us to the Malad police station and finally told us my son had been killed.”

He had rushed to Mumbai the day after the calls stopped coming,but does not wish to travel any more. “It’s very agonising to come to Mumbai. Please spare me this travelling,” he said.

Amarnath looked tired by the continuous grilling by the prosecutor and the defence lawyer. After a point,he just nodded his head to all the questions posed.

Additional sessions judge C A Jadhav summoned three witnesses on May 5: Neeraj’s cousin and roommate Nishanth Grover,Susairaj’s neighbour Mayuri who had last seen Susairaj and Neeraj together,and Nishant Lal,a friend of Neeraj.