Gulbarg accused say it’s illegal to make them witnesses

Lawyers representing the accused in the Gulbarg society massacre have filed an application with the SIT court urging the court not to consider the accused as witness in the case.

The defense counsel's application says that according to article 20 and 21 of the Constitution a person cannot be compelled to be a witness in a case and if he is compelled to do so then it is a violation of his personal liberty.  Earlier, SIT had taken the sting operation tapes conducted by Tehelka as serious evidence in the case and had filed an application in the special court of judge BU Joshi to permit them to take a voice spectrograph of the three accused in the Gulbarg Society massacre.

The trio was video-taped during the sting operation titled Operation Kalank' in 2007. SIT required voice samples of the accused to compare them with the voice recorded in the sting operation tapes. The defense counsel through the application urged that there is no provision in CrPC which makes the accused a witness in the same case. And hence the voice spectrograph of the accused should not be recorded.  The court will hear the matter on Tuesday.  Earlier, during the sting operation the three accused in the Gulbarg killings  - Madan Chawal, Mangilal Jain and Raju Prahlad boasted how they had killed people particularly MP Ahesan Jafri on the fateful day.

SIT also recorded the statement of Tehelka reporter Ashish Khaitan, who carried out the sting operation. The tapes show the accused stating that the police not only gave them a free hand, but also exhorted the rioters to kill Muslims.  Jain said that Meghaninagar police inspector, KG Erda told rioters that they had three to four hours to carry out the killings. Raju revealed that the policemen deployed in the area signalled the rioters to go for the kill.