JURORS heard how Kohli made a telephone call to James Dennis, his work colleague in Southampton who had named him to police after a Crimewatch appeal.

Recalling the conversation he said: “I told him that I never had a thought in my dreams that anyone can set up someone for murder just for money.

“He denied it, he said he didn’t do anything.”

Kohli then said James Dennis sent him money over a period of six months, claiming it was “better for them both” if he stayed in India.

The court heard how Kohli used false names, moved around India, stayed up to seven months in Bangalore where he was living with students, eventually moving to Kalimpong where he began working for the Red Cross and met a woman whom the prosecution had previously claimed he married.

Kohli then told the court he had never married Bharati Das and that to his knowledge she was never pregnant with his child – that was a story “cooked” by the local press.

Kohli said he had suspicions that police were on his trail on July 14, 2004.Talking about his decision to go on the run again from Kalimpong, he said: “I was saving myself from the cruel, corrupt police of India.”

Kohli then said how he had been reading the news on the Internet and in newspapers and was aware police in India had been looking for him for “some time” and that Hampshire Police were offering a £70,000 reward in exchange for information as to his whereabouts.

Kohlis defence counsel Abbas Lakha QC said: “When you knew the police in England were looking for you, why didn’t you surrender?” Kohli replied: “So much prize money and also the police in India corrupt.”

Talking about his decision to run away from Kalimpong, Kohli said Ms Das was “so madly in love with me, she wanted to live and die with me. She left with me.”

He said that day they bought a newspaper with his picture in it and they sat together in a park and read it. He said: “I asked her to go to the police and go and collect the prize money, she said she would rather die with me than take the money. We decided to go to Nepal the next day.”