E-Paper
Charges drafted by Pune police against 19 in Elgar Parishad case
The charges drafted against the 19 are punishable under Sections 40 of Unlawful Activity Prevention Act, 1967 read with Section 120 (b) (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.
Charges were drafted by the Pune police against 19 people, including nine arrested activists and lawyers, and five underground members of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) in the Elgar Parishad case on Wednesday.
The charges drafted against the 19 are punishable under Sections 40 of Unlawful Activity Prevention Act, 1967 read with Section 120 (b) (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.
A special court in Pune asked the nine accused in Elgar Parishad case to appoint their own electronic expert for verification of e-evidence provided in the case on Wednesday.
The decision was taken by additional sessions judge SR Navander after the nine opposed the framing of charges in the case. A draft of the charges to be framed against them was presented by Ujwala Pawar, district government pleader and public prosecutor in the case in presence of Shivaji Pawar, assistant commissioner of police and investigating officer in the case.
The nine accused include Surendra Gadling, Arun Ferriera, Shoma Sen, Mahesh Raut, P Varavara Rao, Rona Wilson, Sudha Bharadwaj, Sudhir Dhawale, Vernon Gonsalves.
The opposition to framing of charges came after Gadling, representing himself, stated that the electronic documents provided to them were not complete.
“The prosecution had come on record stating that they have seized 25 terabyte (TB) of data and what we recieved was only 10 TB. We must get all the data before charges are framed,” said Gadling.
This was in addition to the tampering of evidence allegation made by him against the investigation authority during the earlier hearings.
To this, the judge said, “We cannot go on debating about this. You appoint an expert on your behalf and let him meet with the FSL expert and demonstrate the procedure,” said judge Navander.
A team of experts from the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) had made two hard disks per accused and submitted data worth 10TB to each of them.
Ferriera and Gadling had opposed the information provided in the hard disks saying it was incomplete. “How can the charges be framed before I get all the documents which were seized from us?” asked Gadling, raising the tone of his speech.
To which, the judge said, “Keep your prejudice aside.” Gadling quipped saying, “My liberty is at stake, I’m bound to raise my voice.”
However, the prosecution submitted a draft of charges against the accused even though they were not read out or framed against the accused.
Additionally a doctor from the Sassoon General Hospital submitted medical test results of VV Rao to the court. The judge told Rao, “Investigation was conducted to rule out anything bad. Nothing to worry about, the doctors have told me and I’m telling it to you.”
