Prosecution concludes evidence in Narendra Dabholkar murder case

The prosecution in the case of rationalist Dr Narendra Dabholkar's murder has informed a special court that it has concluded the evidence in the case.

The court has now sought the defence say on the prosecution's submission of the conclusion of evidence, special public prosecutor Prakash Suryawanshi said on Thursday.

As a procedural part, the prosecution on Wednesday submitted 'pursis' (a statement of fact) before the court of Special Judge P P Jadhav, stating they have concluded the evidence in the case and filed a final report of the summary of the entire investigation, he said.

Dabholkar was shot dead while on a morning walk in Pune on August 20, 2013.

The CBI had filed a charge sheet against five accused -namely Virendra Sinh Tawde, Sachin Andure, Sharad Kalaskar, Sanjeev Punalekar and Vikram Bhave.

"In the final report, we mentioned that we have not filed a charge sheet against (the other five) accused Manish Nagori, Vikas Khandelwal, Amol Kale, Rajesh Bangera and Amit Degvekar as there was no prosecutable evidence against them," Suryawanshi said.

The Pune police arrested arms dealers Nagori and Khandelwal in November 2013 in connection with Dabholkar's murder, while the CBI arrested Kale, Bangera and Degvekar in 2018. However, all the five got default bail after the CBI failed to file a chargesheet against them in the 90-day period.

"Nagori and Khandelwal got the default bail as no one identified them during the test identification parade and no chargesheet was filed against them. Besides, the CBI did not file a chargesheet against Kale, Bangera and Degvekar and in the final report, we mentioned that no chargesheet was filed against these three accused as there was no evidence found against them," Suryawanshi said.

He said the court has now sought the defence say on the prosecution's submission of the conclusion of the evidence and final report.

After seeking the response from other side, the process to record statements of the accused under CrPC 313 (C) will start, and after the statements the court will ask the defence whether they want to produce any witnesses in the trial.