Mumbai, Jun 25 A court here on Thursday dismissed a plea filed by the accused in the 2018 murder of a senior executive of HDFC Bank claiming that he was a minor at the time of the crime.
Additional Sessions Judge Anil Salunkhe held that Sarfaraz Shaikh, the accused, had submitted a falsified school record.
The court relied upon a bone-age (ossification) test conducted at J J Hospital which concluded that he was between 25 to 28 years old.
Siddharth Sanghvi (38), a vice president at HDFC Bank, disappeared after leaving for work on September 5, 2018. His car was found in Kopar Khairane, Navi Mumbai, with bloodstains and a sharp-edged knife.
Following technical analysis of Call Detail Records (CDR), police arrested Sarfaraz Shaheed Shaikh who allegedly confessed to killing the victim during a robbery, and dumping his body near the Haji Malang Road.
Police subsequently recovered the body. Shaikh was booked under multiple sections of the Indian Penal Code, including 302 (murder), 397 (robbery) and 201 (destroying evidence).
Shaikh claime that he was born on July 20, 2001 and submitted a school leaving certificate from a school in Uttar Pradesh. Being a minor at the time of the crime, he should not be tried before a regular court, he contended.
However, the court noted that the transfer certificate used to secure his admission actually belonged to a different student named Satishkumar Kallu Masih.
Due to the conflicting documentary evidence, the court ordered a bone-age test. A committee of four medical officers at J J Hospital conducted the test in May 2025 and concluded that the accused's age was between 25 and 28 years.
