New Delhi, Aug 12 (DHNS): The Supreme Court on Monday granted bail to Shubha Shankaranarayan (32), who was accused of hatching a conspiracy, along with three others, to kill her fiancé B V Girish in Bangalore in 2003.

The accused, who is a law graduate, was sentenced to life imprisonment by the trial court in 2010 after being held guilty in the murder case. The Karnataka High Court confirmed her conviction and sentence in 2010.

Taking up her bail plea, a bench of Justices Dipak Misra and V Gopala Gowda noted that the accused has been in custody for more than 52 months.

Since it would take further time to hear her appeal challenging the conviction and sentence, there was no point in putting her behind bars, the court said, while granting her bail.

According to the police, Shubha was the mastermind and the prime accused in the murder of Girish, a software engineer, to whom she was engaged in November 2003. They were to be married five months later.

Her alleged boyfriend Arun Verma, her junior in B M S College of Law, his cousin Dinakar alias Dinesh and Venkatesh are the co-accused. All of them were also sentenced to life term by the trial court.