These 22 witnesses include three policemen, who were part of the team formed by Sadanand Date, additional commissioner of police, central region.
Advocate KP Pawar, appointed to defend Pakistani gunman Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab in the 26/11 terror attacks, declined to cross-examine 22 of the 26 ‘formal’ witnesses on Friday.
These 22 witnesses include three policemen, who were part of the team formed by Sadanand Date, additional commissioner of police, central region, who went to the sixth floor of Cama Hospital and combated Kasab and his accomplice Abu Ismail.
After he was injured, Date had asked his wireless operator, Sachin Tilekar, to inform the policemen standing outside the hospital to send reinforcements. The court has learnt that Tilekar had passed the message to ATS chief Hemant Karkare, who was shot dead outside the hospital.
Two more constables — Mohan Sinde and Vijay Pawar — were also with Date and ran out of the hospital after they were injured.
“These witnesses are not formal witnesses. They are injured and the charge of section 307 (attempt to murder) applies on the accused,” said criminal lawyer Sudeep Pasbola.
Pawar examined four witnesses. Rajendra Yadav, who was shot in his stomach at CST railway station, identified Kasab in the special court. He said: “I was on platform number one when the firing began. I saw Kasab from a distance of 20-25 feet.” He was, however, not called to identify Kasab during the test-identification parade. Another injured witness, Pappu Singh failed to identify Kasab.
While submitting the 340 affidavits of ‘formal’ witnesses, special public prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam had said that none of the witnesses were eye-witnesses. Also, the witnesses have no direct or indirect bearing on Kasab’s case, he had said.
Shamsuddin Sayed who was present when the inquest panchnama of dead body of Karkare was being done spoke about five injuries on his body and said that four articles were recovered.
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