Additional Sessions Judge S S Rathi said it was very unfortunate that the life of a man was snatched by none other than his own friends. “The manner in which Manish was enticed and abducted by his friends to a house where he was murdered by them has given a real bad name to the sacred human bondage called friendship,” ASJ Rathi observed. “If a friend’s call starts ending up in such tragedies, the day is not far when people will start losing faith in this human bond.”

The court said the case was peculiar, for there were several instances of friends extending helping hands to each other whereas in the present case, a friend had killed the other. “Nothing in this world can undo the damage suffered by Manish’s family but what is more painful that they lost a young lovable member at the hands of none other than a friend,” the court said.

In the case, convicts Ravi Bhatti, an MBA graduate who was working as a deputy manager at a private firm, and Pardeep Pillai, a software expert then employed as assistant manager in a telecom company, had given a call to Manish asking him to see them near Liberty Cinema on October 8, 1998.  

Manish, 24, who was newly married, was however abducted to Dwarka with the intent to demand ransom from his family. But even before the two could ask for ransom, a feud between them and the victim saw the latter stabbed to death.