Man Sentenced To 10 Years In Jail For Abetment To Suicide A Year After Wife Jumps Into Sabarmati River

A man accused of abetting the suicide of wife, who jumped into the Sabarmati river after making an emotional video in February last year, was sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment by a court in Gujarat's Ahmedabad on Thursday.

Additional sessions judge C S Adhvaryu found Arif Khan, the husband of Ayesha Makrani, guilty of abetting her suicide and sentenced him to 10 years in prison and imposed a fine of Rs 1 lakh on him.

Apart from the statements of relatives and other witnesses, the court relied mainly on electronic evidence, including Ayesha's video clip, a 70-minute-long audio clip of the conversation between the couple and a voice spectrography test of the accused. On February 25 2021, Ayesha jumped into the Sabarmati river moments after shooting an emotional video, in which she was seen asking her father not to pursue the domestic violence case against Arif because she loves him despite her suffering during the marriage.

The police investigation revealed that Ayesha had decided to end her life following continuous mental and physical torture by Arif and his family. Ayesha had married Arif, a native of Rajasthan, in 2018. However, she returned to her parent's house in Ahmedabad in 2020 due to harassment and lodged a complaint of domestic violence against her husband and in-laws. Before jumping into the river from the riverfront on February 25, Ayesha had a 70-minute-long telephonic conversation with Arif and spoke to her parents, who pleaded with her not to take any extreme step.

Notably, Ayesha's video, which she had shared with her parents before killing herself, had created a huge uproar after it went viral on social media. Arif was nabbed from Rajasthan immediately after the incident.