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Cops rule out right wing role in Dabholkar murder
The Pune police on Friday ruled out the involvement of any right wing group in the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar on August 20.
The Pune police on Friday ruled out the involvement of any right wing group in the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar on August 20.
In an affidavit filed in Bombay high court, the police said doctor-turned-social activist Dabholkar did not face any threats to his life.
The affidavit was submitted by Pune assistant police commissioner Rajendra Bhamre before a division bench headed by Justice PV Hardas in a public interest petition filed by journalist-activist Ketan Tirodkar, demanding that the National Investigation Agency (NIA) probe the case.
Bhamre said there was no evidence on record to show that this offence fell under the purview of the NIA Act.
Dabholkar was shot dead by at least three unidentified persons while out on a morning walk near the Omkareshwar Temple, close his home.
A breakthrough has eluded the police despite 22 investigation teams questioning more than 1,100 people along with 700 history-sheeters. The police have also scanned closed-circuit TV footage from the vicinity.
In 1989, Dabholkar founded the Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmoolan Samiti (society for the eradication of blind faith) with like-minded people and raised his voice against superstition, irrational practices and blind faith and beliefs.
He confronted dubious tantriks, babas and buas — people who claimed to have supernatural powers to prey on gullible people.
Dabholkar was instrumental in pushing the state government to frame an anti-superstition law which was finally approved and passed as an ordinance a day after his murder.
The new law seeks to eradicate black magic, blind faith, superstitious beliefs, rituals and sacrifices to drive out evil spirits or ensure male progeny, perpetrated by self-styled godmen and practitioners of witchcraft and wizardry.
