A special court on Friday sent three doctors arrested for allegedly abetting Dr Payal Tadvi's suicide to judicial custody till June 10. This came as a huge relief for their families who were present for the proceedings. Bhakti Mehare, Hema Ahuja and Ankita Khandelwal were produced before the additional sessions judge R M Sadrani, who rejected the argument of the special public prosecutor Raja Thakare and the Mumbai Crime Branch that had sought a seven-day extension of the accused's police custody.

No substantial evidence
After hearing both sides, Sadrani observed, "Nothing from the case diary and post-mortem report has revealed this to be a murder. No substantial evidence has been collected to grant further police custody." "There has been no recovery of the suicide note for which police custody was sought. Today, the custody has been sought mainly on the grounds that it is necessary for the confrontation of the accused with the other witnesses. In my opinion, police custody cannot be granted for this purpose alone. The grounds raised by the prosecution to seek police custody are insufficient," Sadrani said.