Ahmedabad: Five people, including an industrialist's son, have been held guilty on Friday by an additional sessions judge for the gang-rape of Bijal Joshi, who later committed suicide, in a hotel here during a New Year eve party.

Additional Sessions judge Jyotsna Yagnik found five of them guilty while acquitting seven others for want of conclusive evidence. Bijal Joshi, 24, committed suicide on Jan 7, 2004 after she was gang-raped and tortured by her boyfriend Sajal Jain and six others in Room No. 106 of Hotel Ashok Palace in Osmanpura area here during a New Year eve party in 2003.

The main accused Sajal Jain, 32, a father of two, had befriended Joshi. He invited her to the hotel to celebrate the New Year and then raped her along with four of his friends on Dec 31, 2003.

Others who have been held guilty of rape along with Sajal Jain are Sugam Jaiswal, Ashok Jaiswal alias Mandan, Chandan Jaiswal and Dharmendra Jain. Sajal Jain is son of industrialist and owner of Delhi's Apollo Millennium Hospital, S K Jain.

He was arrested on charges of rape and abetting suicide after Joshi committed suicide. In in her suicide note, she named Sajal Jain and his four friends for raping and torturing her. Her body had borne several bite marks.

The Shahibaug police in March 2004 filed a 600-page charge sheet naming 12 people for her rape and suicide in the metropolitan court here. The charge sheet named Sajal Jain, who is Delhi-based dealer of Mahek gutkha, Chandan Jaiswal and Ashok Jaiswal alias Mandan (sons of hotel owner Pannalal Jaiswal) and their friend Sugam Jaiswal.

Two other accused in the case - Karan alias Dharmendra Jain and Manish Jain, both from Rajasthan - are absconding. Pannalal along with his son-in-law Anand Jaiswal had been accused of destruction of evidence along with Sugam's father Harishankar Jaiswal, mother Seema and sister Shreya.

Ashok Patel, Anand-based dealer of Mahek gutkha, has been accused of sheltering Chandan and Mandan. Six policemen, including an inspector of Shahibaug police station, were suspended for their laxity in the case in 2004.

Source : IANS