Adnan’s father Aslam at his Mumbai home on Monday. (PTI)

Mumbai, Jan. 30: Four youths charged with kidnapping and murdering the 16-year-old son of a Mumbai businessman in 2007 after befriending him on Orkut were acquitted today as the prosecution failed to furnish clinching proof and its key witness gave wavering accounts.

The Adnan Patrawala case had been one of the most talked-about in Mumbai in recent years as it highlighted the extent to which Internet-savvy youths could go in their pursuit of easy money by luring targets through social networking sites.

The accused had called Adnan’s father Aslam thrice to demand Rs 2 crore but the prosecution did not give records of the landline number on which the calls were purportedly made. This was seen as one of the most glaring holes that let the accused slip through.

Sujit Nair, Ayush Bhatt, Rajiv Dhariya and Amit Kaushal were accused of strangulating Adnan to death with a nylon rope and dumping his body after news of the abduction broke and their plans went awry. A fifth accused, Khimesh Ambawat, was a minor and is being tried separately by a juvenile court.

Judge S.A. Deshmukh of the city sessions court held that the prosecution had failed to provide evidence linking the four to Adnan’s death. Ashish Chavan, who represented Sujit, said: “There is a death but its link with the accused was not proved.”

Adnan’s parents expressed shock. “This is very shocking, justice has been denied to us. I don’t know why the court has given this kind of judgment. The case was very straightforward and clear. I will seek further counsel from my lawyer and decide on approaching higher courts,” said Aslam

Adnan’s mother Lubna echoed the dismay. “I don’t know what went wrong but something has gone wrong,” she said.

Adnan’s body was found in his silver Skoda Octavia on August 20, 2007, along Palm Beach Road near Navi Mumbai’s Vashi, two days after he had left his house in the vehicle to meet the accused at Inorbit, a popular mall in Malad. Vashi is over 20km away from the mall.

According to special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam, the accused had called Adnan to a gaming zone in the mall and then kidnapped him for ransom. The prosecution’s case rested primarily on the statements of two witnesses. One of them, Dialyn Dias, had told the court that he had heard the accused plot the kidnapping in the mall two days before it happened.

“It was alleged that the five accused were planning the conspiracy in the mall and that Dias, sitting five feet away at another table, had heard them. The prosecution claimed the accused told him (Dias) that it was a joke but when he saw news of Adnan being murdered on August 19 on TV, he informed the police,” Chavan said.