Aurangabad arms haul case: Jundal yet to be arrested

The trial in the 2006 Aurangabad arms haul case is likely to be delayed. This is because the prosecution submitted on Monday that the charges be framed against all the accused including Zabiuddin Ansari alias Abu Jundal, who is yet to be arrested in the case.

The trial in the 2006 Aurangabad arms haul case is likely to be delayed.

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This is because the prosecution submitted on Monday that the charges be framed against all the accused including Zabiuddin Ansari alias Abu Jundal, who is yet to be arrested in the case.

The special MCOCA court was to frame charges against 21 accused, who have so far been chargesheeted in the case. However, during the hearing, special public prosecutor Raja Thakare pointed out that Jundal, one of the key accused, has recently been arrested by the police. Hence, he requested the court to wait further and frame the charges of all the accused in the case, including Jundal.

However, the defence advocates objected, stating it would further delay the commencement of the trial. They argued that Jundal had not yet been arrested in the case, and that his custody had been given to the crime branch for investigation in the 26/11 terror attack case.

“It would take a long time for the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) to arrest Jundal in the case and file a charge sheet against him. Apart from this they would take even more time to bring him to trial as he is wanted in many terror-related cases, and several other states are claiming his custody,” they contended.

The special public prosecutor argued, however, that they would try to obtain his custody from the crime branch on July 31 and arrest him in the case soon. The court has scheduled the next hearing next week, when all the 21 accused in the case are expected to remain present. The court will now decide on whether it should proceed with framing of the charges by next week or wait.

On June 26, the special court had issued a production warrant against Jundal as he is one of the wanted accused in the case. As per the prosecution’s case, in May 2006, the ATS had booked 21 accused for carrying huge amount of explosives and arms. The ATS had claimed to have seized 43kg of RDX, 50 hand grenades, 16 AK-47 rifles and over 3,000 live bullets from two cars on the Chandaud- Manmad Highway in Aurangabad.

The ATS claimed that the Indica car, which was allegedly driven by Jundal, could not be intercepted at that time. The ATS had later seized 13 kg of RDX and six AK-47s from Malegaon and 50 grenades from Ankai village near Manmad in Nashik district.