The Twisha Sharma Case: A Grand Wedding, a Gilded Cage, and a Nation Demanding Justice
Introduction
India has once again been forced to confront one of its most enduring and painful social wounds. The death of Twisha Sharma — a 33-year-old actress, model, and daughter-in-law of a retired judicial officer — has ignited nationwide outrage and sparked a legal firestorm that now reaches all the way to the Supreme Court. Her story is one that many Indian women know in different degrees: a fairytale beginning that quietly, insidiously, turned into something far darker. And by the time anyone was paying attention, it was already too late.
Who was Twisha Sharma?
Twisha Sharma was not an unknown face. Originally from Noida, she had built a career for herself in the entertainment industry, appearing in several South Indian films. Most recently, she had been drawing attention for her association with the Rashmika Mandanna-starrer The Girlfriend, a project that had elevated her profile considerably. She was a working professional with ambitions, connections in the film world, and a life that seemed, at least on the surface, to be moving forward.
She was 33 years old when she died. She was also pregnant.
How It Began: A Dating App, a Lavish Wedding, and a Move to Bhopal
Twisha met Samarth Singh in 2024 through a dating app — a modern beginning to what her family hoped would be a modern, equal partnership. Samarth is a criminal lawyer by profession, and his family carries significant institutional weight: his mother, Giribala Singh, is a retired judicial officer in Madhya Pradesh.
After a period of courtship, both families agreed to the match. In December 2025, Twisha and Samarth were married in a grand ceremony in Delhi — a wedding attended by film personalities, lawyers, and judges. It was, by all accounts, a celebration befitting two well-connected families.
Following the wedding, Twisha relocated from Noida to Bhopal, moving into her husband’s residence in the upscale Katara Hills area. For a woman who had been building an independent career in the entertainment industry, it was a significant transition — from the professional world she knew, to a new city, a new household, and an entirely new social environment. That transition, her family now alleges, became the beginning of her suffering.
The Allegations: Dowry Harassment, Isolation, and Cruelty
Twisha’s family has consistently maintained that she was subjected to relentless mental and physical harassment after the marriage. They allege that she was pressured over dowry-related demands, isolated from her own support network, and subjected to a pattern of cruelty that wore her down over the months that followed.
What makes this case particularly striking — and particularly disturbing — is the power dynamic at play. Samarth Singh is not an ordinary accused. He is a practising lawyer who knows the legal system intimately. His mother is a former judge. For a young woman experiencing abuse within a household with such institutional authority, the barriers to speaking out would have been extraordinarily high. Who do you call when the people who are supposed to protect you are the very people connected to the law itself?
Reports suggest that as the months progressed after her marriage, Twisha became increasingly cut off. The vibrant professional life she had led before her wedding gave way to the narrow confines of domestic expectations that her husband’s family imposed. Her family has raised concerns about procedural lapses in the initial investigation, suggesting that the full picture of what Twisha endured in her matrimonial home has not yet been made fully public.
May 12, 2026: The Night Everything Ended
According to Samarth Singh’s own lawyer, the evening of May 12 appeared unremarkable on the surface. Samarth reportedly dropped Twisha to a beauty parlour during the day and picked her up afterward. In the evening, the couple went for a walk together. They returned home, watched television, and had dinner. Then, later that night, Twisha reportedly went upstairs, saying she needed some space.
She was found hanging.
The news of her death did not become widely public until May 18 — six days after the incident. The delay itself has raised questions. In those six days, Samarth Singh did not appear before the public or the police. His mother, Giribala Singh, had applied for anticipatory bail. The man at the centre of the case had, for all practical purposes, vanished.
Police registered an FIR invoking Sections 80(2), 85, and 3(5) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) — the provisions corresponding to dowry death, cruelty to a married woman, and common intent under the now-replaced IPC — along with Sections 3 and 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act. Twisha was pregnant when she died.
The Accused Go to Ground
What followed Twisha’s death laid bare just how differently the law operates depending on who you are and what connections you have.
Samarth Singh remained untraceable for approximately ten days after the case gained national attention. A reward of Rs. 10,000 was announced for information leading to his arrest. In the meantime, his mother Giribala Singh — herself a retired judicial officer — secured anticipatory bail from a trial court, a development that triggered immediate outrage and legal challenges.
Twisha’s father approached the Madhya Pradesh High Court to challenge the anticipatory bail granted to Giribala Singh. The state government of Madhya Pradesh independently filed a petition before the same court, seeking to have the order set aside. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta appeared on behalf of the state and argued that the anticipatory bail had been granted in an extremely hasty manner, without due application of mind to the gravity of the alleged offences.
The Madhya Pradesh High Court issued notices on both petitions and continued to monitor the case closely.
Meanwhile, in a separate but equally significant development, the Bar Council of India took the unusual step of suspending Samarth Singh’s licence to practise law with immediate effect, pending the outcome of the criminal investigation. The BCI’s move sent a clear signal: professional credentials do not immunise anyone from accountability when serious criminal allegations have been raised.
A Second Post-Mortem and the Push for a CBI Probe
Twisha’s family raised serious concerns about the first post-mortem examination, questioning whether it had been conducted with adequate thoroughness given the sensitivities of the case — particularly the fact that the accused’s family had deep ties to the legal and judicial establishment in Madhya Pradesh.
The Madhya Pradesh High Court responded by ordering a second post-mortem examination, recognising the family’s concerns as legitimate. The order marked an acknowledgement that the investigation required additional safeguards and independent scrutiny.
Simultaneously, the state government indicated that it was actively considering handing the investigation over to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), rather than allowing local police — who operate within the same institutional ecosystem as the accused’s family — to continue the probe alone.
Samarth Singh Surfaces – and Deflects
After ten days of remaining out of reach, Samarth Singh eventually appeared before the Jabalpur High Court on May 23, 2026, expressing a willingness to surrender. He was taken into custody by Jabalpur police and subsequently handed over to Bhopal police, who sought a seven-day remand to continue the investigation.
His lawyer wasted no time presenting the defence narrative. According to counsel Mrigendra Singh, Samarth had not been absconding at all — he had simply been exercising his legal right to seek anticipatory bail. The lawyer further claimed that Samarth was completely shattered by his wife’s death and had no involvement in it.
Most notably, the defence sought to shift responsibility onto Twisha’s own family, claiming that they had not wanted her to live the life of a housewife in Bhopal. Twisha’s mother-in-law, Giribala Singh, had reportedly made public remarks in which she stated that after marriage, a woman should remain devoted and faithful to her husband — remarks that were widely criticised as derogatory toward the deceased.
Samarth’s lawyer, rather than distancing his side from those remarks, defended them as entirely reasonable expectations of married life.
The Supreme Court Steps In
The case took a decisive turn on May 24, 2026, when the Supreme Court of India took suo motu cognizance — registering a case on its own initiative, without waiting for a formal petition. A bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi, and Justice Vipul Pancholi registered the matter under the case title: IN RE: ALLEGED INSTITUTIONAL BIAS AND PROCEDURAL DISCREPANCIES IN THE UNNATURAL DEATH OF A YOUNG GIRL AT HER MATRIMONIAL HOME.
The case title itself is striking. The Supreme Court did not frame this as an ordinary criminal matter. It named the central concern directly: institutional bias and procedural discrepancies. In doing so, the court recognised what many observers had been saying all along — that when the accused hold positions of power within the very system meant to deliver justice, the ordinary processes of law are at risk of being distorted.
The matter was scheduled for hearing today, May 25, 2026.
Why This Case Matters Beyond the Headlines
The Twisha Sharma case is being discussed in offices, on social media, and in living rooms across India — and rightly so. But it deserves more than outrage. It deserves a clear-eyed examination of the systemic failures it exposes.
Dowry-related violence and deaths remain a persistent problem in India, despite decades of legal reform. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, thousands of dowry death cases are reported every year, and that number almost certainly undercounts the reality. The law on paper is strong — Section 304-B, Section 498-A, the Dowry Prohibition Act. The gap between law and practice, however, remains cavernous.
That gap widens dramatically when the accused have social capital: professional credentials, judicial connections, and the knowledge and resources to exploit every procedural mechanism available to delay accountability. The speed with which anticipatory bail was secured for Giribala Singh, while Twisha’s family was still processing their grief, illustrates exactly how that advantage plays out in practice.
The Supreme Court’s decision to frame its intervention around “institutional bias” suggests that the highest court in the land sees what critics have been pointing to: that this is not simply a case of domestic violence. It is a case that tests whether India’s legal institutions can hold themselves to the same standards they apply to everyone else.
What Justice would Look Like
Justice in the Twisha Sharma case must be several things at once.
It must be swift, because the delay between her death and any meaningful legal accountability has already been too long. It must be independent, which is why the CBI referral is both appropriate and necessary. It must be thorough — the second post-mortem, the forensic examination of communications and evidence from her time in Bhopal, the recording of testimonies from those who knew her and knew the household she lived in.
And it must be honest about power. The fact that a retired judge’s family was able to secure anticipatory bail with apparent ease, that a practising lawyer could remain out of reach for ten days while the nation watched, that derogatory remarks about a dead woman could be publicly defended by her husband’s legal team — all of this needs to be part of the record that the Supreme Court examines.
Twisha Sharma was a pregnant woman who died in her matrimonial home less than five months after her wedding. Her family says she was harassed, isolated, and driven to despair. She deserved protection. She did not get it. The question now is whether, in death, she will finally receive the justice that was denied to her in life.
The Supreme Court bench comprising CJI Surya Kant, Justice Joymalya Bagchi, and Justice Vipul Pancholi is scheduled to hear the suo motu matter today, May 25, 2026. The Madhya Pradesh government’s proposal for a CBI investigation is currently under consideration by the central government. Samarth Singh is in police custody, and the second post-mortem report is pending.
If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse or harassment, please seek help from trusted family, legal aid services, or contact the National Commission for Women (NCW) helpline.
