Malegaon Blast: 29th witness turns hostile; 'Statement in ATS charge sheet never recorded'

A day after the 28th witness in the 2008 Malegaon bomb blast case turned hostile at a special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court hearing in the case, now on Saturday, November 5, the 29th witness also turned hostile. The witness is a retired army personnel. The witness appeared before the court earlier in the day and said that the statement mentioned in the ATS chargesheet, has never been recorded, and also stated that he does not know anyone and never met any of the accused. Following this, the court declared him hostile. The next hearing is scheduled to take place on November 7. 

Earlier, one of the accused in the case, Sameer Kulkarni said that the witness told a special court that he hasn't given any statement to ATS Mumbai and could not remember anything. He said, "Once again, the lie of ATS Mumbai has been exposed in front of the country. The NIA court in Mumbai today recorded the statement of a prosecution witness. The witness said that he hasn't given any statement to ATS and he doesn't remember anything. He is the 28th person in the case who has been declared hostile."

2008 Malegaon blast case

On September 29, 2008, after a bomb strapped to a motorcycle went off near a masjid in Malegaon, six people were killed and over 100 others were injured. The accused in this case are BJP MP Pragya Thakur, Lt. Col. Purohit, Sameer Kulkarni, Ajay Rahikar, Ramesh Upadhyay, Sudhakar Dwivedi, and Sudhakar Chaturvedi.

They have been booked under Sections 16 (committing the terrorist act) and 18 (conspiring to commit terrorist act) of the UAPA. Sections 120 (b) (criminal conspiracy), 302 (murder), 307 (attempt to murder), 324 (voluntarily causing hurt), and 153 (a) (promoting enmity between two religious groups) of the IPC. Relevant provisions of the Explosive Substances Act have also been included in the FIR. Notably, the NIA took over the Malegaon Bomb Blast case in 2013. Earlier, the case was with Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS).