Placement: Two of the five accused have been convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in a special court on Friday. The remaining three, including the “mastermind,” were involved in the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar, a veteran on August 20th, 2013.
According to special judge PP Jadhav, Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar were found guilty of shooting Dabholkar at Deccan’s Gymkhana police station near Omkareshwar temple bridge at Vitthal Ramji Shinde around 7.15 am for life imprisonment. The judge also convicted both of them with common intention for the murder charge and fined each convict Rs 5 lakh.
This is what Panvel-based ENT surgeon Virendrasinh Tawde has been called by CBI as the mastermind while Vikram Bhave and Mumbai lawyer Sanjeev Punalekar have both been charged with aiding and abetting the shooter, said Judge Jadhav. “The prosecution failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that there was a conspiracy involving Tadeh,” he added before acquitting him.”
“Bawe and Punalika were suspects but nothing had been proved against them so they have been discharged,” ruled Justice Jadhav.
The court concluded that the charges under UAPA were not proved and that appropriate permission under UAPA was not taken by the competent authority.
Defense lawyer Prakash Sarsinjikar argued petitioner’s case couldn’t be considered as rarest of rare cases entitling death penalty according to Supreme Court ruling because it lacked an element of premeditation thus life sentence remained only option left for court to impose upon them.
Tad was also an accused in February 2015 killing of Left leader Govindrao Pansare in Kolhapur who too had been given regular bail from Kolhapur court in that matter.
With his discharge in the Dabholkar case, Tad’s custody will be shifted to a Kolhapur court where he is likely to come out of jail after signing his bail bond and completing other formalities.
Bawe and Punalika were released on bail pending the trial for Dabholkar.
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Outside the court, “We are yet to receive the full text of today’s judgment. Once received we would challenge Andure and Karaska’s convictions in the Bombay High Court.”
The CBI rushed through its investigation just with an aim for conviction however it was ridden with too many questions unanswered, a lot of things not investigated properly; particularly around the Pune police incident which was during that time when Crucial days passed between murder and subsequent CBI took over,” said Sarshinjikar.
Earlier, Prakash Suryawanshi, Special Public Prosecutor, and Advocate Virendra Ichalkaranjikar were asked by the bench whether this case was still being monitored by Supreme Court. They replied no.
Punalika had also filed perjury petition against retired CBI IO SR Singh but nothing was found against him therefore it was dismissed by judge. He claimed that Singh had fabricated witness evidence against him in that case.
