Chemistry professor accused of killing husband stuns legal circles with her arguments
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Bhopal: A chemistry professor stunned Madhya Pradesh High Court when she defended her case with the aplomb of a professor explaining thermal burn marks and electric burn marks to a classroom.
Mamta Pathak, an assistant professor of chemistry, who is accused of murdering her husband by electrocution, used the skills from several years of teaching chemistry, when the judge asked her ‘What do you have to say about the post-mortem's findings?’
To which the 60-year-old replied ‘Sir, it is not possible to differentiate between thermal burn marks and electric burn marks in a post-mortem room’.
Mamta Pathak gave the division bench of Justice Vivek Agarwal and Justice Devnarayan Mishra a complex explanation on how electric current interacts with tissues.
She pointed to the deposition of medical metal particles, acid-based separations in lab tests, and chemical reactions that can only be accurately interpreted post-lab analysis, NDTV reported.
She made it clear that these observations are not visually possible.
The arguments she laid out during the hearing of the murder case have stunned the legal circles with somebody on social media terming it as ‘one of the most unusual courtroom defenses in recent memory.’
Mamta Pathak is accused of having administrated heavy dose of sleeping pills to her husband Neeraj Pathak before electrocuting him on April 29, 2021 in Madhya Pradesh's Chhatarpur.
It is reported that she then left for Jhansi with her son but told police that she had returned from Jhansi on May 1 and found her husband dead.
However, a voice recording of Neeraj Pathak that emerged subsequently claimed that Mamta Pathak had tortured him.
Along with this, their driver’s testimony of Mamta Pathak having confessed to a ‘big mistake’ turned the case against her.
The investigations revealed that she previously accused her husband of domestic abuse, and filed complaint that he had drugged her food but later withdrew the case.
Mamta Pathak approached the High Court and secured bail last year after a sessions court found her guilty and sentenced her to a life term.
Mamta Pathak remains out on bail after the Bench has reserved judgement following the last hearing on April 29.
