Extradition treaty flouted? Salem lawyer off to Portugal

Abu Salem’s lawyer left for Portugal on Tuesday to seek legal opinion on whether the Indian government has violated the terms of extradition treaty by carrying out further investigation in the cases against him. Lawyer P Tiwari said that Salem’s lawyer Ashok Sarogi had left for Portugal on Tuesday to consult his client’s counsellors in Portugal.

Tiwari said the Indian government had informed the Lisbon court that Salem was required only for the purposes of trial in some criminal cases pending in India and assured that no further investigation would be done in those cases.

But fresh chargesheets have been filed against Salem in the Pradeep Jain murder case, Ajit Dewani murder case and 1993 serial blasts case. Tiwari alleged that the police had also forced him to sign a confessional statement, which Salem later retracted. Salem was extradited from Portugal on November 11, 2005.

Meanwhile, Bombay High Court on Tuesday gave the police two weeks’ time to reply to a petition filed by Salem challenging a TADA Court order converting his judicial custody to police custody.

After his extradition, Salem was given police custody on November 23 last year following which he was in judicial custody from January 3.

On January 12, the TADA court once again sentenced him to police custody till January 17 despite complaints of cruelty by the police. The petition stated that the police custody from January 12 to 17 was illegal and unconstitutional.