Three years after prominent television broadcaster Chandra Narine Sharma was committed to stand trial in the High Court on charges of having carnal knowledge of a girl and indecent assault, he was yesterday freed after the complainants expressed a lack of interest in pursuing the case further.
The case against Sharma was the first case to be called before Justice James Bovell Drakes when the October session of the Demerara Assizes began yesterday.
Sharma had been charged with three counts of carnal knowledge of a girl under 12 years, two counts of carnal knowledge of a girl under 15 years and one count of indecent assault of a female. He was represented by Attorney Nigel Hughes.
The jury was yesterday instructed to return a formal verdict of not guilty and the charges were dismissed after the complainants refus-ed to proceed with the matter.
Sharma was charged in April of 2010 and was initially refused bail but collapsed in court and had to be rushed for medical treatment. He was later placed on $2 million bail.
Later that same year, he was also charged with attempting to obstruct the course of justice where it was alleged that he removed two of the girls at the centre of sex abuse allegations against him from their known address and took them to a house at 123 Golden Grove, East Bank Demerara in order to prevent them from being questioned by police.
The presiding magistrate had granted him $100,000 bail. He was also arraigned on another charge of witness tampering and was released on $150,000 bail.
Those matters were subsequently dismissed.
