Pune court's decision in narendra Dabholkar murder case...
A special court for UAPA cases in pune, maharashtra has today given its verdict after 11 years in the murder case of Dr. narendra Dabholkar. The court has found three accused innocent and convicted two in the Dabholkar murder case. The convict has been sentenced to rigorous life imprisonment.
In this case, accused Virendra Singh Tawde was accused of conspiracy, but he was acquitted due to the government side not being able to present evidence. Also, the allegations against Punalekar and Bhave have not been proved, hence they are also being acquitted. The charge of murdering Dabholkar against Kalaskar and Andure has been proved, hence both of them have been sentenced to rigorous life imprisonment.
Well-known rationalist Dabholkar (67) was shot dead on august 20, 2013, while taking a morning walk at Omkareshwar Bridge here.
Five people were made accused in the case. During the trial, the prosecution examined 20 witnesses, while the defense examined two witnesses. The prosecution, in its final arguments, had said that the accused were opposed to Dabholkar's campaign against superstition. pune Police had initially investigated the case. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took over the investigation in 2014 following the order of the bombay high court and in june 2016 arrested Dr. Virendra Singh Tawde, an ENT surgeon associated with the Hindu right-wing organization Sanatan Sanstha.
According to the prosecution, Tawde was one of the masterminds of the murder. Tawde and some other accused were associated with Sanatan Sanstha. The cbi had earlier named fugitives Sarang Akolkar and Vinay Pawar as the shooters in its charge sheet. But it later arrested Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar and claimed in a supplementary chargesheet that they had shot Dabholkar. Subsequently, the central agency arrested advocates sanjeev Punalekar and vikram Bhave as alleged co-conspirators.
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