File picture of Janhavi Gadkar being brought to court by police. (Press Trust of India photo)
Jahnavi Gadkar, the lawyer who rammed her car into an oncoming taxi, killing two persons while driving on the wrong side of the road, has been charged with culpable homicide not amounting to murder and drunken driving.
Police filed the charges along with others under the Motor Vehicles Act in a 560-word chargesheet against the 35-year-old woman in a Mumbai court today.
The trial will take place in the Mumbai Sessions Court which had granted her bail after a Mumbai Magistrate's court turned down her pleas twice.
The corporate lawyer had crashed her Audi SUV into a taxi allegedly in a drunken state on the Eastern Freeway while driving at a high speed on the wrong direction. Two people had died in the accident on June 9 this year.
Tests showed that Ms Gadkar's blood samples had three times the permitted level of alcohol on the day of the accident. Under the Motor Vehicles Act, 30 mg of alcohol is the permissible limit for driving.
Among those who were killed was Mohd Sayed Hussain, 56, who drove a taxi for nearly 30 years without a single accident.
Speaking to NDTV in an exclusive interview soon after the accident, Sayed's UK based daughter, Nilofer had said, "She is a lawyer herself. She knows what she is doing. She knows the law. She thinks she can bend the rules. She thinks she go around the corners and get away with what she has done. It is shameful."