New Delhi, October 23: Supreme Court here on Wednesday refused to grant bail to an accused in a case where a woman was killed after being bitten by a snake in Jhunjhunu.

Bench of Chief Justice NV Ramana and Justices Surya Kant Hima Kohli while hearing the bail plea of an accused said, "This is a new trend that people bring poisonous snakes from snake charmers and kill a person through snake bite. This is now becoming common in Rajasthan."

Advocate Aditya Chaudhary, appearing for the accused Krishna Kumar who is alleged to be an accomplice in the murder, said, "There is no direct evidence against the accused". He said that his client’s association started and ended with going to the snake charmer with the main accused and had bought a snake for Rs.10,000. He added that Kumar did not know why his friend was buying snakes or poison. He was told that it was needed for medicinal purposes.

Further, the lawyer said Kumar did not even go to the woman's house. He added that the accused is an engineering student and he should get bail for the sake of his future.

The crime had made headlines in 2019 when a woman was killed by her daughter-in-law by getting her bitten by a snake Jhunjhunu district of Rajasthan. The reason cited is that the daughter-in-law, Alpana, had an extramarital affair with Manish, a resident of Jaipur.

According to police, only Alpana and her mother-in-law, Subodh Devi used to live together in her husband’s house as Alpana's husband and brother-in-law were both in the army and they used to live away because of their profession. Even Alpana’s father-in-law and Subodh Devi's husband Rajesh also used to live away from home due to his job.

Sachin and Alpana were married in December 2018. It is alleged that while her husband was away, Alpana had gotten into an extramarital affair with Manish. It seems that they used to talk often and when Subodh Devi came to know about it started taunting her daughter-in-law for always being on the phone and threatening that she will tell this to her husband.

After this, the mother-in-law increasingly became a hindrance in the love story, Alpana and her lover Manish hence planned to kill Subodh Devi in a manner that they would not get traced.

On June 2, 2019, Subodh Devi was bitten by a snake. Everybody thought that it was an accident and even the police had closed the case. However, a month and a half after the incident, Alpana's in-laws suspected her and lodged a police complaint. They also gave some evidence. The family gave the phone numbers of Alpana and Manish to the police.

According to the police records, on June 2, the day of the incident, 124 calls were made between Alpana and Manish and 19 calls were made between Alpana and Krishna Kumar. Some messages were also shared between these numbers.

The police then said that Alpana, Manish and their friend Krishna Kumar were involved in the murder of Subodh Devi. All the three accused were arrested on January 4, 2020, and have been in jail since then, without bail.