A narrative has been created in the mainstream media that the murders of social activist Dr Dabholkar in Pune in 2013, Communist politician Govind Pansare in Kolhapur and academic MM Kalburgi in Bangalore in 2015 and journalist Gauri Lankesh in Bangalore in 2017 were part of a larger conspiracy by some Hindu organisations to eliminate “rationalists”. In fact, all the accused in the cases are Hindu activists. I have been tracking all four investigations and trials closely for the past five years. After a detailed study of primary sources such as the chargesheets filed by the CBI, FIR copies, witness statements and related court judgements, I have published two books on this subject.
Throughout the past four years, I have maintained that the evidence against the people arrested in these cases was flimsy, that there is no proof of any such conspiracy and that the likely outcome would be acquittal. In this context, I have been proven at least partially right. Almost eleven years after social activist Dr Narendra Dabholkar was shot dead in Pune, a district court has pronounced its verdict on the accused. It has acquitted three of the accused, Advocate Sanjiv Punalekar, Vikram Bhave and Dr Virendra Tawde of all charges, and convicted two – Sharad Kalaskar and Sachin Andure – of shooting Dr Dabholkar. All the five accused have been acquitted of the charges framed under UAPA and conspiracy to murder.
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Even then, a perusal of the judgment of the Pune District Court leaves several unanswered questions and certainly raises serious concerns. Kiran Kamble and Vinay Kelkar were the star witnesses for the prosecution, and their evidence has been instrumental in the conviction of Kalaskar and Andure as the persons who shot Dr Dabholkar. However, a look at their statements shows that they are far from being reliable. Since the names of the accused were flashed across the country on television and admittedly seen by the witnesses too, it would be reasonable to believe that the identification of photographs bearing the name of the accused compromises Kelkar and Kamble’s credibility as well as that of the CBI. But the honourable judge does not agree. The honourable judge notes, “PW6 (Kiran Kamble) and PW14 (Vinay Kelkar) have fairly admitted that they had seen photographs of accused nos.2 and 3 in newspaper. Whether it is a lapse on part of investigating machinery to publish photographs of accused is different aspect.” He further notes, “In the cross examination of Vinay Kelkar, it is specifically brought on record that the sketch of assailants prepared on the basis of description given by Vinay Kelkar does match with the photo of the accused.” I am reproducing the sketches and photographs here for the reader to make his own opinions on the same.
The witness statement of Vinay Kelkar also reveals that he has not definitively identified the accused from the named photographs shown to him. His statement noted on Kalaskar’s photograph (Exhibit 460 & 461) reads as follows: “I Vinay Kelkar hereby declare that assassination incident took place 5 yrs ago & distance took place is too far away from me. I declare that suspects resemble the faces of criminals; however, they cannot be positively identified by me”. (signed) Vinay Kelkar, 27/12/18.
There is also nothing on record to suggest that Kelkar identified Sachin Andure at any time before the trial. Exhibits 460 and 461 reveal that he had picked out two photographs of the same person, ie Kalaskar, and not one each of Kalaskar and Andure. His noting on both exhibits is identical. Only in court did Kelkar identify Andure as the second shooter. This itself should have raised severe concerns on manipulation of the witness and his lack of credibility. Vinay Kelkar also denied the statements recorded under his name by CBI in 2016 in which he had identified Vinay Pawar as the killer, as well as the sketch resembling Pawar drawn on his description that bears his signature. Despite such serious problems with Vinay Kelkar’s evidence, the honourable judge has still considered this witness reliable enough to convict the accused on his testimony.
In his witness statement given to the Pune police as well as the CBI in 2016, Kiran Kamble has been recorded as being unable to identify any suspects as he was apparently terribly frightened. It is on record that Kamble suffered from memory lapses, and his witness statement itself has several visibly contradictory statements. However, his memory as far as this trial is concerned seems to be getting better and better with time. Two years later, he identified Kalaskar and Andure as the killers based on photographs shown to him by the CBI. Kiran Kamble admitted to “70-80% resemblance” of Kalaskar with the person seen by him, which means there is at least a 20-30% chance that it was not him – much more than needed for a “reasonable doubt” that any accused is entitled to.
Kiran Kamble has admitted that he met and had lunch with one Milind Deshmukh who was an activist of ANiS even on the day of his deposition. However, the learned judge has considered this a “normal practice to keep follow up of prosecution witnesses”, which is surprising and shocking. The same courtesy is not extended to the sisters of both accused whose evidence has been called false and after-thought because they met Advocate Punalekar and their brothers during their brothers’ incarceration (he was representing them in the matter). The sisters had claimed but could not produce photographic proof that their brothers were visiting them on 20th August 2013 (the day Dr Dabholkar was shot dead) for celebrating Raksha Bandhan festival.
It is indeed surprising that despite these obvious and glaring inconsistencies, the learned judge calls the witnesses Kiran Kamble and Vinay Kelkar “reliable and innocent.”
Witness no.9 Sanjay Sadvilkar recorded his statement shortly after Akolkar and Pawar were named as Dabholkar’s murderers by the CBI in 2016. One of his assistants Navnath Jadhav, also produced as witness, has identified Pawar from his photograph. However, with the change in the accused, Sadvilkar’s statement seems to have become a liability. It is shocking that in the recording of statement of Sadvilkar, the learned judge omits the names of Sarang Akolkar and Vinay Pawar identified by Sadvilkar as having accompanied Tawde to meet him, only calling them “two activists”. The learned judge fails to acknowledge that CBI changed the prime accused in the case from Akolkar-Pawar named in their chargesheet in 2016 to Kalaskar-Andure in the supplementary chargesheet of 2018 without offering a proper explanation.
Witness no.10 Somnath Dhayade had recorded in his evidence that he had met Sachin Andure at a Hindu Janajagruti Samiti function in 2012 and that he confessed to having murdered Dabholkar to him in 2014. However, the learned judge has recorded that it was proven via RTI documents that no such function was held at the venue mentioned by Dhayade during that entire year. Subsequently, the witness claimed that he did not remember the exact year. The learned judge accepts this explanation and labels the challenge to it “irrelevant” as Andure had not denied knowing Dhayade. It has been recorded that Dhayade never approached any legal authority with this information for more than four years until he was called by CBI. A statement was obtained from him implicating Andure only in 2018. It is also accepted that Dhayade’s son was facing prosecution for illegal sale of liquor in a case filed just a year before his deposition. It is certainly possible that pressure was applied by the investigating agencies on Dhayade to give such a statement for building their case in lieu of lenient action or release of his son from the said case. However, the honourable judge still calls this witness independent and credible.
The learned judge has agreed that there are infirmities, material contradictions and omissions in the evidence of each witness if the evidence is scrutinized in isolation. But in the very next line, he observes, “However, when the evidence is evaluated collectively, all these three witnesses are found trustworthy and fully reliable.” When the evidence of each of the said witnesses has been proven to not exactly having been reliable, logic dictates that they cannot be considered collectively reliable.
On the one hand, the learned judge has dismissed the charge of conspiracy to murder against all the five accused including Kalaskar and Andure. On the other hand, he observes that Kalaskar and Andure had no personal enmity with Dabholkar and that the “masterminds” behind the murder have not yet been caught. This is self-contradictory. The question of “masterminds” does not arise once the conspiracy charge has been thrown out. If there is no motive and no conspiracy, the case against Kalaskar and Andure should naturally collapse. The learned judge has questioned the investigating agencies for not being able to procure any evidence against Dr Tawde, Advocate Punalekar and Vikram Bhave and hinted at political interference. However, the facts do not support this. Dr Tawde spent more than eight years in jail without being granted bail. The CBI contested bail granted to Vikram Bhave up to the Supreme Court and lost. Even the lawyer of the accused, Advocate Punalekar, was himself made an accused and put on trial. On the other hand, the only weapons forensically matched to Dabholkar’s murder were recovered from Manish Nagori and Vikas Khandelwal, who are known history sheeters and arms dealers. But the CBI admittedly failed to file chargesheet against them resulting in grant of bail, and later withdrew the case against them. It can therefore more convincingly be argued that despite having no evidence against Tawde, Punalekar and Bhave, the investigating agencies harassed, arrested and tried to implicate them for political reasons.
In summary, the entire judgment seems to presuppose guilt of accused 2 (Sachin Andure) and 3 (Sharad Kalaskar) rather than considering them “innocent until proven guilty by a competent court beyond reasonable doubt”. The benefit of doubt in case of Andure and Kalaskar has been given to the witnesses and the prosecution rather than the accused. This is unfortunate. On the brighter side, the said judgment offers plenty of scope for Andure and Kalaskar to raise a challenge in higher courts, where they would, due to the reasons stated above, stand a decent chance at acquittal.
