New Delhi:
The father of an accused in the December 16 gang-rape case on Saturday told a special court in Delhi that his son was not on the bus in which a 23-year-old girl was gang-raped by six people.
Heera Lal, father of accused Pawan Gupta, defending his son before Additional Sessions Judge Yogesh Khanna, claimed his son is innocent and has been falsely implicated.
"I asked my daughter about Pawan and she informed that his son had come to the jhuggi (house) and taken drink and chicken and thereafter had gone to the district park to attend some music function. I then went to the district park along with my brother-in-law in his car to bring Pawan. A musical programme was going on and I found my son lying on the bench," Lal said.
He said that as Pawan was heavily drunk and was not in a position to walk, he and his brother-in-law had lifted him from the park and put him a car.
"Though we put water on Pawan's face to bring him back to senses, he was heavily intoxicated and came to senses on December 17, 2012 morning," Pawan's father claimed.
Earlier during recording his statement before the court, Pawan had also claimed that he was not in the bus and had gone to a music function along with co-accused Vinay Sharma.
However, one of the accused Mukesh told the court that he was driving the bus in which the girl was raped and her friend was attacked by his elder brother Ram Singh (deceased), Vinay, Pawan, Akshay Thakur and the juvenile who is being tried by a juvenile justice board separately.
Same were the submissions of the other three defence witnesses in the case.
The medical student died of her injuries on December 29 last year while undergoing treatment in a Singapore hospital.
During the trial, Ram Singh was found dead in Tihar Jail on March 11 and court proceedings against him stand abated.