Shivangi Sinha
Sheena Bora, a lively young woman residing in Mumbai, was flourishing in both her professional and personal life. She excelled at work, was happily engaged to a man she loved, and was actively pursuing her prospects. However, things soon changed as her last known sighting was on April 24, 2012. Shockingly, it wasn’t until 2015 that the revelation of her murder emerged, leading to the arrest of four individuals connected to the case. In Netflix’s ‘The Indrani Mukerjea Story: The Buried Truth,’ the documentary sheds light on the key figures involved in the investigation and addresses lingering questions about the circumstances surrounding her fate.
The Alleged Murder of Sheena Bora Came to Light After 3 Years
Sheena Bora was born to Indrani Mukerjea on February 11, 1987, in Shillong. Indrani and her husband Siddhartha Das soon welcomed Sheena’s younger brother Mekhail to their family, hinting at a promising future. However, as her marriage unraveled, Indrani decided to let Sheena and Mekhail grow up with their grandparents, Upendra Kumar Bora and Durga Rani, in Guwahati while she chose to relcoate to Kolkata. This meant Sheena spent a significant part of her childhood under the care of her grandparents and well away from her mother.
It thus comes as no surprise that in a diary belonging to Sheena, there were several poignant entries where she expressed dissatisfaction and emotional pain due to her mother’s lack of communication and connection with both her and Mekhail as they grew up. She even felt abandoned and questioned her mother’s love for her. Though everything turned upside down in 2005 as the family discovered Indrani had relocated to Mumbai and married Peter Mukerjea three years prior after divorcing Sanjeev Khanna in Kolkata. Upon this revelation, they reached out to Indrani, urging her to provide financial support for Sheena and the rest of the family as they were struggling.
To their surprise, Indrani actually responded and, as per Mekhail’s account, invited them to Mumbai where she then laid out a condition for her support. She vehemently insisted that the societal image and life she’d carefully built in Mumbai were valuable to her. Consequently, she required Sheena and Mekhail to present themselves as her much younger siblings, not her children, when interacting with others. After agreeing to these terms, Sheena ended up relocating to Mumbai too, where she subsequently commenced her studies at St. Xavier’s College in 2006.
Sheena also began residing with Indrani, Peter, and Vidhie (Indiani’s daughter from her marriage with Sanjeev), in their Worli, Mumbai residence. In 2008, Rahul Mukerjea, Peter’s son from a previous marriage, joined them too. Soon, Sheena and Rahul developed a close bond and romantic relationship. However, Indrani disapproved of their connection, resulting in frequent conflicts between mother and daughter. Following her graduation in 2009, Sheena entered the workforce, resulting in her standing on her own two feet, moving out, and getting a place with Rahul.
In 2011, Rahul and Sheena became engaged. However, the relationship between Indrani and Sheena had significantly deteriorated. In an attempt to reconcile with her mother and improve the family situation, the youngster reached out to her mother in 2012. She received a response in the form of a dinner invite for April 24, 2012. On that day, Rahul picked his fiance up from her workplace and dropped her off in Bandra, where she was supposed to meet Indrani.
The following day, Rahul received a text from Sheena, stating it was time for them to call it quits and he should move on. Simultaneously, she submitted her resignation. When Rahul tried to call, she didn’t pick up, so he reached out to Indrani and his father for information. That’s when they claimed she had gone to the United States and expressed her desire to not be disturbed for a while. Rahul was persistent for more answers though, especially since her passport was still at one of the Mukerjea homes, but he received nothing more than guesses and further such claims. Sheena, at times, did communicate with friends and family via email, but it was notably from a different email address than the one she’d previously been using.
On August 21, 2015, prompted by an anonymous tip-off, Mumbai police suddenly apprehended Shyamvar Rai for the illegal possession of weapons. Rai, who was Indrani’s driver, confessed to his involvement in the alleged murder of Sheena Bora on the night of August 24, 2012. He provided a detailed account of the purported events, stating that Indrani, Sanjeev, and he had conspired to carry out the plan. According to Rai, they picked up Sheena from Bandra as part of their orchestrated scheme.
According to Rai’s account, during the fateful night, Sheena and Indrani were in the back seat of the car, while Sanjeev sat in the front alongside him, who was driving. Allegedly, they headed to a secluded road in Mumbai, where Indrani provided Sheena with a spiked drink, rendering her unconscious. That’s when Sanjeev moved to the back seat, and together they strangled Sheena to death.
Rai then detailed that they drove Sheena’s body back to Indrani’s residence before placing it in the trunk. Additionally, he claimed that Indrani had applied makeup on her daughter in an attempt to make it seem less suspicious. Continuing his testimony, he even stated that the following morning, he, along with Indrani and Sanjeev, traveled to Raigad, where they set Sheena’s body on fire in the woods.
A Forensic Team Identified Sheena Bora’s Remains
Acting on Shyamvar Rai’s information, the police discovered and exhumed a body at the alleged burial site of Sheena Bora. She’d actually been found back in 2012 itself, but no investigations were done at the time, leading to her getting buried in a grave near there only. In 2015, the forensic team from All India Institute of Medical Science confirmed through examination that the remains indeed belonged to Sheena Bora. The report concluded that she had died from strangulation and had suffered asphyxiation.
Indrani Mukerjea, Shyamvar Rai, Sanjeev Khanna, and Peter Mukerjea have since been arrested in connection to Sheena’s murder. While Shyamvar as well as Sanjeev have both reportedly confessed to their involvement in this alleged matter, Peter and Indrani have remained rather public with their claims of innocence. Peter faces charges of murder, conspiracy, plus causing the disappearance of evidence for apparently knowing of and covering up the crime, whereas his ex-wife (their divorce was finalized in 2019) faces counts of murder, causing disappearance of evidence, criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery, kidnapping, and conspiracy. In 2021, Indrani claimed Sheena was alive in Jammu and Kashmir, a statement refuted by the CBI in 2022. Despite the conflicting narratives, the case continues to be under judicial consideration.
Read More: Indrani Mukerjea: Where is Sheena Bora’s Mom Now?
