29-05-2025
‘Are you a chemistry professor?': 60-year-old woman accused of husband's murder stuns judge with scientific talk
A viral video on social media shows a 60-year-old woman explaining the difference between types of burn marks to a Madhya Pradesh High Court judge, who informed her that a post-mortem report proved death by electrocution. Refuting the report, the retired teacher offered a comprehensive explanation, prompting the judge to ask if she was a professor; she replied that she used to be a chemistry professor.
Mamta Pathak was representing herself in court in April after she was accused of murdering her husband, Neeraj Pathak, by electrocuting him in 2021. Pathak was found guilty of murder and sentenced to a life term in 2022, but she approached the High Court with an appeal. A short clip of her defending herself in court recently has surprised many on social media.
"You are accused of murdering your husband by electrocution. The doctor who conducted the post-mortem said that the body had clear signs of being electrocuted," Madhya Pradesh High Court Justice Vivek Agarwal tells the former teacher in the clip, recorded in April this year.
Dressed in all white, the professor rejects the finding and boldly claims that the determination of such burn marks was not possible. She delivers a brief lesson on how electricity and tissue interact and explains how acids are used to analyse whether the burns are thermal or electrical. She dismisses the claim that a determination of electrocution can be made just visually.
The answer surprised the judge, who stopped her halfway to confirm that she was a chemistry professor. Surprised by her explanation, he nodded to a lawyer seated behind her, who reciprocated his reaction.
Pathak presented her case in front of the division bench of Justice Vivek Agarwal and Justice Devnarayan Mishra. After the last hearing, the Bench reserved judgment while the professor remained on bail.
The Madhya Pradesh police had arrested Mamta Pathak for killing her husband, 63-year-old Neeraj Pathak, a retired government doctor 63, by giving him sleeping pills and allegedly inflicting electric shocks on him.
She had then left Jhansi and claimed that she had found her husband dead when she returned. However, the police found audio of Neeraj Pathak, which went viral on social media, claiming his wife tortured him.
'Mamta came to know that Neeraj Pathak was in a relationship with another woman. Mamta had also filed a complaint with the police in January 2021 that her husband used to give her sedative pills by mixing them in food so that he could meet another woman. However, she withdrew the complaint later,' the police had said in the chargesheet.
A sessions court had found her guilty of murder and sentenced her to a life term. She then approached the High Court to appeal the decision and got bail last year.
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